Michael J. Behe is an
AmericanThe United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
biochemistBiochemists are scientists who are trained in biochemistry. Typical biochemists study chemical processes and chemical transformations in living organisms. The prefix of "bio" in "biochemist" can be understood as a fusion of "biological chemist."-Role:...
,
authorAn author is broadly defined as "the person who originates or gives existence to anything" and that authorship determines responsibility for what is created. Narrowly defined, an author is the originator of any written work.-Legal significance:...
, and
intelligent designIntelligent design is the proposition that "certain features of the universe and of living things are best explained by an intelligent cause, not an undirected process such as natural selection." It is a form of creationism and a contemporary adaptation of the traditional teleological argument for...
advocate. He currently serves as
professorA professor is a scholarly teacher; the precise meaning of the term varies by country. Literally, professor derives from Latin as a "person who professes" being usually an expert in arts or sciences; a teacher of high rank...
of biochemistry at
Lehigh UniversityLehigh University is a private, co-educational university located in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, in the Lehigh Valley region of the United States. It was established in 1865 by Asa Packer as a four-year technical school, but has grown to include studies in a wide variety of disciplines...
in
PennsylvaniaThe Commonwealth of Pennsylvania is a U.S. state that is located in the Northeastern and Mid-Atlantic regions of the United States. The state borders Delaware and Maryland to the south, West Virginia to the southwest, Ohio to the west, New York and Ontario, Canada, to the north, and New Jersey to...
and as a senior fellow of the
Discovery Institute'sThe Discovery Institute is a non-profit public policy think tank based in Seattle, Washington, best known for its advocacy of intelligent design...
Center for Science and CultureThe Center for Science and Culture , formerly known as the Center for the Renewal of Science and Culture , is part of the Discovery Institute, a conservative Christian think tank in the United States...
. Behe is best known for his argument for
irreducible complexityIrreducible complexity is an argument by proponents of intelligent design that certain biological systems are too complex to have evolved from simpler, or "less complete" predecessors, through natural selection acting upon a series of advantageous naturally occurring, chance mutations...
, which asserts that some biochemical structures are too
complexIn general usage, complexity tends to be used to characterize something with many parts in intricate arrangement. The study of these complex linkages is the main goal of complex systems theory. In science there are at this time a number of approaches to characterizing complexity, many of which are...
to be adequately explained by known evolutionary mechanisms and are therefore more probably the result of
intelligent designIntelligent design is the proposition that "certain features of the universe and of living things are best explained by an intelligent cause, not an undirected process such as natural selection." It is a form of creationism and a contemporary adaptation of the traditional teleological argument for...
. Behe has testified in several court cases related to intelligent design, including the court case
Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School DistrictTammy Kitzmiller, et al. v. Dover Area School District, et al. was the first direct challenge brought in the United States federal courts testing a public school district policy that required the teaching of intelligent design...
that resulted in a ruling that intelligent design was religious in nature.
Behe's claims about the irreducible complexity of essential
cellularThe cell is the basic structural and functional unit of all known living organisms. It is the smallest unit of life that is classified as a living thing, and is often called the building block of life. The Alberts text discusses how the "cellular building blocks" move to shape developing embryos....
structures have been rejected by the vast majority of the
scientific communityThe scientific community consists of the total body of scientists, its relationships and interactions. It is normally divided into "sub-communities" each working on a particular field within science. Objectivity is expected to be achieved by the scientific method...
, and his own biology department at Lehigh University published an official statement opposing Behe's views and intelligent design. Behe is a Roman Catholic, and is married to Celeste Behe, and they have nine children who are homeschooled by Celeste in
Bethlehem, PennsylvaniaBethlehem is a city in Lehigh and Northampton Counties in the Lehigh Valley region of eastern Pennsylvania, in the United States. As of the 2010 census, the city had a total population of 74,982, making it the seventh largest city in Pennsylvania, after Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, Allentown, Erie,...
.
Education and academics
Behe grew up in
Harrisburg, PennsylvaniaHarrisburg is the capital of Pennsylvania. As of the 2010 census, the city had a population of 49,528, making it the ninth largest city in Pennsylvania...
, where he attended grade school at St. Margaret Mary's Parochial School and later graduated from
Bishop McDevitt High SchoolBishop McDevitt High School is a private, coeducational Catholic high school of the Diocese of Harrisburg, located in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, United States. The school was founded in 1918 and renamed in 1957 to honor the memory of the Most Reverend Philip R. McDevitt, fourth bishop of Harrisburg...
. He graduated from
Drexel UniversityDrexel University is a private research university with the main campus located in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA. It was founded in 1891 by Anthony J. Drexel, a noted financier and philanthropist. Drexel offers 70 full-time undergraduate programs and accelerated degrees...
in 1974 with a
Bachelor of ScienceA Bachelor of Science is an undergraduate academic degree awarded for completed courses that generally last three to five years .-Australia:In Australia, the BSc is a 3 year degree, offered from 1st year on...
in
chemistryChemistry is the science of matter, especially its chemical reactions, but also its composition, structure and properties. Chemistry is concerned with atoms and their interactions with other atoms, and particularly with the properties of chemical bonds....
. He got his
PhDPHD may refer to:*Ph.D., a doctorate of philosophy*Ph.D. , a 1980s British group*PHD finger, a protein sequence*PHD Mountain Software, an outdoor clothing and equipment company*PhD Docbook renderer, an XML renderer...
in
biochemistryBiochemistry, sometimes called biological chemistry, is the study of chemical processes in living organisms, including, but not limited to, living matter. Biochemistry governs all living organisms and living processes...
at the
University of PennsylvaniaThe University of Pennsylvania is a private, Ivy League university located in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States. Penn is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States,Penn is the fourth-oldest using the founding dates claimed by each institution...
in 1978 for his dissertation research on
sickle-cell diseaseSickle-cell disease , or sickle-cell anaemia or drepanocytosis, is an autosomal recessive genetic blood disorder with overdominance, characterized by red blood cells that assume an abnormal, rigid, sickle shape. Sickling decreases the cells' flexibility and results in a risk of various...
. From 1978 to 1982, he did postdoctoral work on
DNADeoxyribonucleic acid is a nucleic acid that contains the genetic instructions used in the development and functioning of all known living organisms . The DNA segments that carry this genetic information are called genes, but other DNA sequences have structural purposes, or are involved in...
structure at the
National Institutes of HealthThe National Institutes of Health are an agency of the United States Department of Health and Human Services and are the primary agency of the United States government responsible for biomedical and health-related research. Its science and engineering counterpart is the National Science Foundation...
. From 1982 to 1985, he was assistant professor of chemistry at Queens College in
New York CityNew York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
, where he met his wife, Celeste. In 1985, he moved to
Lehigh UniversityLehigh University is a private, co-educational university located in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, in the Lehigh Valley region of the United States. It was established in 1865 by Asa Packer as a four-year technical school, but has grown to include studies in a wide variety of disciplines...
and is currently a Professor of Biochemistry. Due to Behe's views on evolution, Lehigh University exhibits the following disclaimer on its website:
Irreducible complexity and intelligent design
Behe says he once fully accepted the
scientific theoryA scientific theory comprises a collection of concepts, including abstractions of observable phenomena expressed as quantifiable properties, together with rules that express relationships between observations of such concepts...
of
evolutionEvolution is any change across successive generations in the heritable characteristics of biological populations. Evolutionary processes give rise to diversity at every level of biological organisation, including species, individual organisms and molecules such as DNA and proteins.Life on Earth...
, but that after reading
Evolution: A Theory In CrisisEvolution: A Theory in Crisis is a 1985 book by Michael Denton in which he claims that the scientific theory of evolution by natural selection is a "theory in crisis"...
, by
Michael DentonMichael John Denton is a British-Australian author and biochemist. In 1973, Denton received his PhD in Biochemistry from King's College London.-Biography:...
, he came to question evolution. Later, Behe came to believe that there was evidence, at a biochemical level, that there were systems that were "
irreducibly complexIrreducible complexity is an argument by proponents of intelligent design that certain biological systems are too complex to have evolved from simpler, or "less complete" predecessors, through natural selection acting upon a series of advantageous naturally occurring, chance mutations...
". These were systems that he thought could not, even in principle, have evolved by
natural selectionNatural selection is the nonrandom process by which biologic traits become either more or less common in a population as a function of differential reproduction of their bearers. It is a key mechanism of evolution....
, and thus must have been created by an "intelligent designer," which he believed to be the only possible alternative explanation for such complex structures. The logic is very similar to the
watchmaker analogyThe watchmaker analogy, or watchmaker argument, is a teleological argument for the existence of God. By way of an analogy, the argument states that design implies a designer...
given by William Paley in 1802 as proof of a divine creator.
After the 1987
Edwards v. AguillardEdwards v. Aguillard, was a legal case about the teaching of creationism that was heard by the Supreme Court of the United States in 1987. The Court ruled that a Louisiana law requiring that creation science be taught in public schools, along with evolution, was unconstitutional because the law...
decision in which the U.S. Supreme Court barred the required teaching of
creation scienceCreation Science or scientific creationism is a branch of creationism that attempts to provide scientific support for the Genesis creation narrative in the Book of Genesis and disprove generally accepted scientific facts, theories and scientific paradigms about the history of the Earth, cosmology...
from public schools but allowed evolutionary theory on the grounds of scientific validity, some creationists felt that new strategies and language were necessary to return religious notions to science classrooms. The supplementary school textbook
Of Pandas and PeopleOf Pandas and People: The Central Question of Biological Origins is a controversial 1989 school-level textbook written by Percival Davis and Dean H. Kenyon and published by the Texas-based Foundation for Thought and Ethics...
was altered to change references to
creationismCreationism is the religious beliefthat humanity, life, the Earth, and the universe are the creation of a supernatural being, most often referring to the Abrahamic god. As science developed from the 18th century onwards, various views developed which aimed to reconcile science with the Genesis...
to use the term
intelligent designIntelligent design is the proposition that "certain features of the universe and of living things are best explained by an intelligent cause, not an undirected process such as natural selection." It is a form of creationism and a contemporary adaptation of the traditional teleological argument for...
. The books of lawyer
Phillip E. JohnsonPhillip E. Johnson is a retired UC Berkeley law professor and author. He became a born-again Christian while a tenured professor and is considered the father of the intelligent design movement...
on
theistic realismTheistic science, also referred to as theistic realism, Augustinian science or Islamic science is the viewpoint that methodological naturalism should be replaced by a philosophy of science that is informed by supernatural revelation and/or allows occasional supernatural explanations. The viewpoint...
, which strayed away from direct statements about a
Young EarthYoung Earth creationism is the religious belief that Heavens, Earth, and all life on Earth were created by direct acts of the Abrahamic God during a relatively short period, sometime between 5,700 and 10,000 years ago...
and stuck to criticisms of evolutionary theory and purported biased "materialist" science, aimed to legitimise the teaching of creationism in schools. In March 1992 a conference at
Southern Methodist UniversitySouthern Methodist University is a private university in Dallas, Texas, United States. Founded in 1911 by the Methodist Episcopal Church, South, SMU operates campuses in Dallas, Plano, and Taos, New Mexico. SMU is owned by the South Central Jurisdiction of the United Methodist Church...
brought Behe together with other leading figures into what Johnson later called the
wedge strategyThe wedge strategy is a political and social action plan authored by the Discovery Institute, the hub of the intelligent design movement. The strategy was put forth in a Discovery Institute manifesto known as the Wedge Document, which describes a broad social, political, and academic agenda whose...
. In 1993 "the Johnson-Behe cadre of scholars" met at Pajaro Dunes, and Behe presented for the first time his idea of 'irreducibly complex' molecular machinery. Following a summer 1995 conference, "The Death of Materialism and the Renewal of Culture," the group obtained funding through the
Discovery InstituteThe Discovery Institute is a non-profit public policy think tank based in Seattle, Washington, best known for its advocacy of intelligent design...
. In 1996 Behe became a senior fellow of the Discovery Institute's
Center for the Renewal of Science and Culture (later renamed the
Center for Science and CultureThe Center for Science and Culture , formerly known as the Center for the Renewal of Science and Culture , is part of the Discovery Institute, a conservative Christian think tank in the United States...
) dedicated to promoting intelligent design.
In 1993, Behe wrote a chapter on blood clotting in
Of Pandas and PeopleOf Pandas and People: The Central Question of Biological Origins is a controversial 1989 school-level textbook written by Percival Davis and Dean H. Kenyon and published by the Texas-based Foundation for Thought and Ethics...
, presenting arguments which he later presented in very similar terms in a chapter in his 1996 book
Darwin's Black BoxDarwin's Black Box: The Biochemical Challenge to Evolution is a book written by Michael J. Behe and published by Free Press in which he presents his notion of irreducible complexity and claims that its presence in many biochemical systems indicates therefore that they must be the result of...
. Behe later agreed that they were essentially the same when he defended intelligent design at the Dover Trial.
Darwin's Black Box
In 1996, Behe published his ideas on irreducible complexity in his book
Darwin's Black BoxDarwin's Black Box: The Biochemical Challenge to Evolution is a book written by Michael J. Behe and published by Free Press in which he presents his notion of irreducible complexity and claims that its presence in many biochemical systems indicates therefore that they must be the result of...
.
Behe's credentials as a biochemist gave the
intelligent design movementThe intelligent design movement is a neo-creationist religious campaign for broad social, academic and political change to promote and support the idea of "intelligent design," which asserts that "certain features of the universe and of living things are...
a key proponent. Behe's refusal to identify the nature of any proposed
intelligent designerAn intelligent designer, also referred to as an intelligent agent, is the hypothetical willed and self-aware entity that the intelligent design movement argues had some role in the origin and/or development of life...
frustrates scientists, who see it as a move to avoid any possibility of testing the positive claims of ID while allowing him and the intelligent design movement to distance themselves from some of the more overtly religiously motivated critics of evolution.
As to the identity of the intelligent designer, Behe responds that if, deep in the woods, one were to come across a group of flowers that clearly spelled out the name “LEHIGH,” one would have no doubt that the pattern was the result of intelligent design. Determining who the designer was, however, would not be nearly as easy. He remarks:
“Inferences to design do not require that we have a candidate for the role of designer. We can determine that a system was designed by examining the system itself, and we can hold the conviction of design much more strongly than a conviction about the identity of the designer.” Darwin's Black BoxDarwin's Black Box: The Biochemical Challenge to Evolution is a book written by Michael J. Behe and published by Free Press in which he presents his notion of irreducible complexity and claims that its presence in many biochemical systems indicates therefore that they must be the result of...
, pp 195-6.
“… “designer” is often seen as a not-too-subtle code word for God, both by those who like the implications and by those who don’t. …Like it or not, a raft of important distinctions intervene between a conclusion of design and identification of a designer. …The designer need not necessarily even be a truly “supernatural” being. …if one wishes to be academically rigorous, one can’t leap directly from design to a transcendent God. …To reach a transcendent God, other, nonscientific arguments have to be made – philosophical and theological arguments. …It is not my purpose here...to say why I myself find some of those arguments persuasive and others not. Here I’m content to “take ‘purposeful designer’ in a very broad sense.”” The Edge of EvolutionThe Edge of Evolution: The Search for the Limits of Darwinism is a book promoting intelligent design by Discovery Institute fellow Michael Behe, published by the Free Press in 2007...
, pp 227-9.
Behe gives the following reply to the assertion that intelligent design is “unfalsifiable” or that he is attempting to avoid the possibility of testing the positive claims of intelligent design:
"In fact, my argument for intelligent design is open to direct experimental rebuttal. Here is a thought experiment that makes the point clear. In Darwin’s Black Box (Behe 1996) I claimed that the bacterial flagellum was irreducibly complex and so required deliberate intelligent design. The flip side of this claim is that the flagellum can’t be produced by natural selection acting on random mutation, or any other unintelligent process. To falsify such a claim, a scientist could go into the laboratory, place a bacterial species lacking a flagellum under some selective pressure (for mobility, say), grow it for ten thousand generations, and see if a flagellum--or any equally complex system--was produced. If that happened, my claims would be neatly disproven."
To this, these responses have been made:
"Behe’s claim that intelligent design would be ‘disproven’ is not correct for the simple fact that no legitimate test of the intelligent design theory has been provided in his example. Once again, what we have to acknowledge is that in order to test intelligent design theory, the required test conditions must be such that the causal interaction between an intelligent agent and organism must be available to observation.... Behe’s suggestion of an experiment involving active selection for mobility is quite irrelevant to testing an intelligent design theory since the causal conditions involve the experimenter, not the intelligent agent to which the theory refers."
"Behe is wrong. Even if his experiment did produce the flagellum, ID’s proponents could argue that the intelligent agent was merely acting in the test tube. There is no way to tell, from this experiment, whether the intelligent agent was actually working inside the laboratory; therefore, the test does not falsify the theory."
"There simply is no way to replicate the number of sequential trials (i.e. the total population of bacteria or the amount of genetic variation within that population) or the amount of time involved....[A computer simulation] showed that a binding site that Behe himself characterized as irreducibly complex could evolve in 20,000 years. Yet here he is demanding that scientists do an actual experiment with actual bacteria, the numbers of which could not possibly be contained in a lab, on the evolution of a much more complex biochemical system that would almost certainly take longer to evolve than the whole of recorded human history."
Behe has charged that his detractors are inconsistent:
"Coyne's conclusion that design is unfalsifiable, however, seems to be at odds with the arguments of other reviewers of my book. Clearly, Russell Doolittle (Doolittle 1997), Kenneth Miller (Miller 1999), and others have advanced scientific arguments aimed at falsifying ID. ...If the results with knock-out mice (Bugge et al. 1996) had been as Doolittle first thought, or if Barry Hall's work (Hall 1999) had indeed shown what Miller implied, then they correctly believed my claims about irreducible complexity would have suffered quite a blow. And since my claim for intelligent design requires that no unintelligent process be sufficient to produce such irreducibly complex systems, then the plausibility of ID would suffer enormously. …Now, one can't have it both ways. One can't say both that ID is unfalsifiable (or untestable) and that there is evidence against it. Either it is unfalsifiable and floats serenely beyond experimental reproach, or it can be criticized on the basis of our observations and is therefore testable. The fact that critical reviewers advance scientific arguments against ID (whether successfully or not) shows that intelligent design is indeed falsifiable."
Unlike
William A. DembskiWilliam Albert "Bill" Dembski is an American proponent of intelligent design, well known for promoting the concept of specified complexity...
and others in the intelligent design movement, Behe accepts the
common descentIn evolutionary biology, a group of organisms share common descent if they have a common ancestor. There is strong quantitative support for the theory that all living organisms on Earth are descended from a common ancestor....
of species, including that
humanHumans are the only living species in the Homo genus...
s descended from other
primateA primate is a mammal of the order Primates , which contains prosimians and simians. Primates arose from ancestors that lived in the trees of tropical forests; many primate characteristics represent adaptations to life in this challenging three-dimensional environment...
s, although he states that common descent does not by itself explain the differences between species. He also accepts the scientific consensus on the
age of the EarthThe age of the Earth is 4.54 billion years This age is based on evidence from radiometric age dating of meteorite material and is consistent with the ages of the oldest-known terrestrial and lunar samples...
and the
age of the UniverseThe age of the universe is the time elapsed since the Big Bang posited by the most widely accepted scientific model of cosmology. The best current estimate of the age of the universe is 13.75 ± 0.13 billion years within the Lambda-CDM concordance model...
. In his own words:
"Evolution is a controversial topic, so it is necessary to address a few basic questions at the beginning of the book. Many people think that questioning Darwinian evolution must be equivalent to espousing creationism. As commonly understood, creationism involves belief in an earth formed only about ten thousand years ago, an interpretation of the Bible that is still very popular. For the record, I have no reason to doubt that the universe is the billions of years old that physicists say it is. Further, I find the idea of common descent (that all organisms share a common ancestor) fairly convincing, and have no particular reason to doubt it. I greatly respect the work of my colleagues who study the development and behavior of organisms within an evolutionary framework, and I think that evolutionary biologists have contributed enormously to our understanding of the world. Although Darwin's mechanism – natural selection working on variation – might explain many things, however, I do not believe it explains molecular life. I also do not think it surprising that the new science of the very small might change the way we view the less small." Darwin's Black BoxDarwin's Black Box: The Biochemical Challenge to Evolution is a book written by Michael J. Behe and published by Free Press in which he presents his notion of irreducible complexity and claims that its presence in many biochemical systems indicates therefore that they must be the result of...
, pp 5-6.
"For example, both humans and chimps have a broken copy of a gene that in other mammals helps make vitamin C. ... It's hard to imagine how there could be stronger evidence for common ancestry of chimps and humans. ... Despite some remaining puzzles, there’s no reason to doubt that Darwin had this point right, that all creatures on earth are biological relatives.” The Edge of EvolutionThe Edge of Evolution: The Search for the Limits of Darwinism is a book promoting intelligent design by Discovery Institute fellow Michael Behe, published by the Free Press in 2007...
, pp 71-2.
"…it’s understandable that some people find the idea of common descent so astonishing that they look no further. Yet in a very strong sense the explanation of common descent is also trivial. Common descent tries to account only for the similarities between creatures. It says merely that certain shared features were there from the beginning – the ancestor had them...In contrast, Darwin’s hypothesized mechanism of evolution – the compound concept of random mutation paired with natural selection…tries to account for the differences between creatures. …What could cause such staggering transformations? …By far the most critical aspect of Darwin’s multifaceted theory is the role of random mutation. Almost all of what is novel and important in Darwinian thought is concentrated in this third concept." The Edge of EvolutionThe Edge of Evolution: The Search for the Limits of Darwinism is a book promoting intelligent design by Discovery Institute fellow Michael Behe, published by the Free Press in 2007...
, p 2.
In a November 8, 1996 interview
Richard DawkinsClinton Richard Dawkins, FRS, FRSL , known as Richard Dawkins, is a British ethologist, evolutionary biologist and author...
said of Behe:
"He's a straightforward creationist. What he has done is to take a standard argument which dates back to the 19th century, the argument of irreducible complexity, the argument that there are certain organs, certain systems in which all the bits have to be there together or the whole system won't work...like the eyeEyes are organs that detect light and convert it into electro-chemical impulses in neurons. The simplest photoreceptors in conscious vision connect light to movement...
. Darwin answered (this)…point by point, piece by piece. But maybe he shouldn't have bothered. Maybe what he should have said is…maybe you're too thick to think of a reason why the eye could have come about by gradualGradualism is the belief in or the policy of advancing toward a goal by gradual, often slow stages.-Politics and society:In politics, the concept of gradualism is used to describe the belief that change ought to be brought about in small, discrete increments rather than in abrupt strokes such as...
steps, but perhaps you should go away and think a bit harder."
In 1997
Russell DoolittleRussell F. Doolittle is an American biochemist at the University of California, San Diego with focus in structure and evolution of proteins. Born in Connecticut, he earned a B.A. in Biology from Wesleyan University in 1952, and an M.A. in Education from Trinity College in 1957. He earned his Ph.D...
, on whose work Behe based much of the blood-clotting discussion in
Darwin's Black Box, wrote a rebuttal to the statements about irreducible complexity of certain systems. In particular, Doolittle mentioned the issue of the blood clotting in his "A Delicate Balance". Later on, in 2003, Doolittle's lab published a paper in the peer-reviewed journal
Proceedings of the National Academy of Science which demonstrates that the
pufferfishTetraodontidae is a family of primarily marine and estuarine fish of the Tetraodontiformes order. The family includes many familiar species which are variously called pufferfish, balloonfish, blowfish, bubblefish, globefish, swellfish, toadfish, toadies, honey toads, sugar toads, and sea squab...
lacks at least three out of 26 blood clotting factors, yet still has a workable blood clotting system. According to Doolittle, this defeats a key claim in Behe's book, that blood clotting is 'irreducibly complex.'
In reviewing a book by
Robert T. PennockRobert T. Pennock is a philosopher working on the Avida digital organism project at Michigan State University where he has been full professor since 2000. Pennock was a witness in the Kitzmiller v...
, Behe took issue with the "intelligent design" group being associated with "creationism," saying readers would typically take that to mean
biblical literalismBiblical literalism is the interpretation or translation of the explicit and primary sense of words in the Bible. A literal Biblical interpretation is associated with the fundamentalist and evangelical hermeneutical approach to Scripture, and is used almost exclusively by conservative Christians...
and
Young Earth creationismYoung Earth creationism is the religious belief that Heavens, Earth, and all life on Earth were created by direct acts of the Abrahamic God during a relatively short period, sometime between 5,700 and 10,000 years ago...
. In 2001 Pennock responded that he had been careful to represent their views correctly, and that while several leaders of the intelligent design movement were Young Earth creationists, others including Behe were
old-earthersOld Earth creationism is an umbrella term for a number of types of creationism, including gap creationism and progressive creationism...
and "creationists in the core sense of the term, namely, that they reject the scientific, evolutionary account of the origin of species and want to replace it with a form of special creation."
Behe and Snoke article
In 2004, Behe published a paper with
David SnokeDavid W. Snoke is a physics professor at the University of Pittsburgh in the Department of Physics and Astronomy. In 2006 he was elected a Fellow of the American Physical Society "[f]or his pioneering work on the experimental and theoretical understanding of dynamical optical processes in...
, in the
scientific journalIn academic publishing, a scientific journal is a periodical publication intended to further the progress of science, usually by reporting new research. There are thousands of scientific journals in publication, and many more have been published at various points in the past...
Protein Science that uses a simple
mathematical modelA mathematical model is a description of a system using mathematical concepts and language. The process of developing a mathematical model is termed mathematical modeling. Mathematical models are used not only in the natural sciences and engineering disciplines A mathematical model is a...
to simulate the rate of evolution of proteins by point mutation, which he states supports irreducible complexity, based on the calculation of the probability of mutations required for evolution to succeed. However, the paper does not mention intelligent design nor irreducible complexity, which were removed, according to Behe, at the behest of the reviewers. Nevertheless, The Discovery Institute lists it as one of the "Peer-Reviewed & Peer-Edited Scientific Publications Supporting the Theory of Intelligent Design".
Michael LynchMichael Lynch is Distinguished Professor of Evolution, Population Genetics and Genomics at Indiana University, Bloomington, Indiana, USA. Besides many highly acclaimed papers, especially in population genetics, he has written a two volume textbook with Bruce Walsh, widely considered the "Bible" of...
authored a response, to which Behe and Snoke responded.
Protein Science discussed the papers in an editorial.
Numerous scientist have
debunkedA debunker is an individual who attempts to discredit and contradict claims as being false, exaggerated or pretentious. The term is closely associated with skeptical investigation of, or in some cases irrational resistance to, controversial topics such as U.F.O.s, claimed paranormal phenomena,...
the work, pointing out that not only has it been shown that a supposedly irreducibly complex structure can evolve, but that it can do so within a reasonable time even subject to unrealistically harsh restrictions, and noting that Behe & Snoke's paper does not properly include
natural selectionNatural selection is the nonrandom process by which biologic traits become either more or less common in a population as a function of differential reproduction of their bearers. It is a key mechanism of evolution....
and
genetic redundancyGenetic redundancy is a term typically used to describe situations where a given biochemical function is redundantly encoded by two or more genes. In these cases, mutations in one of these genes will have a smaller effect on the fitness of the organism than expected from the genes’ function....
. Some of the critics have also noted that the Discovery Institute continues to claim the paper as 'published evidence for design,' despite its offering no design
theoryThe English word theory was derived from a technical term in Ancient Greek philosophy. The word theoria, , meant "a looking at, viewing, beholding", and referring to contemplation or speculation, as opposed to action...
nor attempting to model the design process, and therefore not providing an alternative to evolution.
Many of Behe's statements have been challenged by biologist
Kenneth MillerKenneth Raymond Miller is a biology professor at Brown University. Miller, who is Roman Catholic, is particularly known for his opposition to creationism, including the intelligent design movement...
in his book,
Finding Darwin's GodFinding Darwin's God: A Scientist's Search for Common Ground Between God and Evolution is a 2000 book by the American cell biologist and Roman Catholic Kenneth R. Miller wherein he argues that evolution does not contradict religious faith...
. Behe has subsequently disputed Miller's points in an online essay.
The Edge of Evolution
In 2007, Behe's book
The Edge of EvolutionThe Edge of Evolution: The Search for the Limits of Darwinism is a book promoting intelligent design by Discovery Institute fellow Michael Behe, published by the Free Press in 2007...
was published arguing that while
evolutionEvolution is any change across successive generations in the heritable characteristics of biological populations. Evolutionary processes give rise to diversity at every level of biological organisation, including species, individual organisms and molecules such as DNA and proteins.Life on Earth...
can produce changes within species, there is a limit to the ability of evolution to generate diversity, and this limit (the "edge of evolution") is somewhere between
speciesIn biology, a species is one of the basic units of biological classification and a taxonomic rank. A species is often defined as a group of organisms capable of interbreeding and producing fertile offspring. While in many cases this definition is adequate, more precise or differing measures are...
and
ordersIn scientific classification used in biology, the order is# a taxonomic rank used in the classification of organisms. Other well-known ranks are life, domain, kingdom, phylum, class, family, genus, and species, with order fitting in between class and family...
. It was reviewed, by prominent scientists in
The New York TimesThe New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
,
The New RepublicThe magazine has also published two articles concerning income inequality, largely criticizing conservative economists for their attempts to deny the existence or negative effect increasing income inequality is having on the United States...
,
The Globe and MailThe Globe and Mail is a nationally distributed Canadian newspaper, based in Toronto and printed in six cities across the country. With a weekly readership of approximately 1 million, it is Canada's largest-circulation national newspaper and second-largest daily newspaper after the Toronto Star...
,
Publishers WeeklyPublishers Weekly, aka PW, is an American weekly trade news magazine targeted at publishers, librarians, booksellers and literary agents...
,
ScienceScience is the academic journal of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and is one of the world's top scientific journals....
, and
NatureNature, first published on 4 November 1869, is ranked the world's most cited interdisciplinary scientific journal by the Science Edition of the 2010 Journal Citation Reports...
who were highly critical of the work noting that Behe appears to accept almost all of evolutionary theory, barring random mutation, which is replaced with guided mutation at the hand of an unnamed designer.
Popular writing
Behe has written opinion/editorial features in the
Boston ReviewBoston Review is a bimonthly American political and literary magazine. The magazine covers, specifically, political debates, literature, and poetry...
,
American Spectator, and
The New York TimesThe New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
. Behe, along with fellow Discovery Institute associates
William A. DembskiWilliam Albert "Bill" Dembski is an American proponent of intelligent design, well known for promoting the concept of specified complexity...
and
David BerlinskiDavid Berlinski is an American educator and author of several books on mathematics. Berlinski is a Senior Fellow of the Discovery Institute's Center for Science and Culture, the hub of the intelligent design movement. Though he criticizes the theory of evolution, Berlinski who is an agnostic,...
, tutored
Ann CoulterAnn Hart Coulter is an American lawyer, conservative social and political commentator, author, and syndicated columnist. She frequently appears on television, radio, and as a speaker at public events and private events...
on science and evolution for her book
Godless: The Church of LiberalismGodless: The Church of Liberalism is a book by best-selling author and conservative columnist Ann Coulter, published in 2006. The book is an argument against American liberalism, which Coulter regards as so anti-scientific and faith-based that it amounts to a "primitive religion" which she claims...
. Coulter devotes approximately one-third of the book to
polemicA polemic is a variety of arguments or controversies made against one opinion, doctrine, or person. Other variations of argument are debate and discussion...
al attacks on evolution, which she terms "
DarwinismDarwinism is a set of movements and concepts related to ideas of transmutation of species or of evolution, including some ideas with no connection to the work of Charles Darwin....
". In the book, Coulter thanks Behe, Dembski and Berlinski for their assistance with this section.
Dover testimony
In
Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School DistrictTammy Kitzmiller, et al. v. Dover Area School District, et al. was the first direct challenge brought in the United States federal courts testing a public school district policy that required the teaching of intelligent design...
, the first direct challenge brought in
United States federal courtsThe United States federal courts make up the judiciary branch of federal government of the United States organized under the United States Constitution and laws of the federal government.-Categories:...
to an attempt to mandate the teaching of intelligent design on
First AmendmentThe First Amendment to the United States Constitution is part of the Bill of Rights. The amendment prohibits the making of any law respecting an establishment of religion, impeding the free exercise of religion, abridging the freedom of speech, infringing on the freedom of the press, interfering...
grounds, Behe was called as a primary witness for the defense and asked to support the idea that intelligent design was legitimate science. Some of the most crucial exchanges in the trial occurred during Behe's
cross-examinationIn law, cross-examination is the interrogation of a witness called by one's opponent. It is preceded by direct examination and may be followed by a redirect .- Variations by Jurisdiction :In...
, where his testimony would prove devastating to the defence. Behe was forced to concede that "there are no peer reviewed articles by anyone advocating for intelligent design supported by pertinent experiments or calculations which provide detailed rigorous accounts of how intelligent design of any biological system occurred" and that his definition of 'theory' as applied to intelligent design was so loose that
astrologyAstrology consists of a number of belief systems which hold that there is a relationship between astronomical phenomena and events in the human world...
would also qualify. Earlier during his direct testimony, Behe had argued that a computer simulation of evolution he performed with Snoke shows that evolution is not likely to produce certain complex biochemical systems. Under cross examination however, Behe was forced to agree that "the number of prokaryotes in 1 ton of soil are 7 orders of magnitude higher than the population [it would take] to produce the disulfide bond" and that "it's entirely possible that something that couldn't be produced in the lab in two years... could be produced over three and half billion years."
Many of Behe's critics have pointed these exchanges as examples that they believe further undermine Behe's statements about irreducible complexity and intelligent design.
John E. Jones IIIJohn Edward Jones III is an American lawyer and jurist from the U.S. state of Pennsylvania. A Republican, Jones was appointed by President George W. Bush as federal judge on the United States District Court for the Middle District of Pennsylvania in February 2002 and was unanimously confirmed by...
, the judge in the case, would ultimately rule that intelligent design is not scientific in his 139 page decision, citing Behe's testimony extensively as the basis for his findings:
- "Consider, to illustrate, that Professor Behe remarkably and unmistakably claims that the plausibility of the argument for ID depends upon the extent to which one believes in the existence of God
Arguments for and against the existence of God have been proposed by philosophers, theologians, scientists, and others. In philosophical terms, arguments for and against the existence of God involve primarily the sub-disciplines of epistemology and ontology , but also of the theory of value, since...
."
name="p28">s:Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District/2:Context#Page 28 of 139
- "As no evidence in the record indicates that any other scientific proposition's validity rests on belief in God, nor is the Court aware of any such scientific propositions, Professor Behe's assertion constitutes substantial evidence that in his view, as is commensurate with other prominent ID leaders, ID is a religious and not a scientific proposition."
- "First, defense expert Professor Fuller agreed that ID aspires to 'change the ground rules' of science and lead defense expert Professor Behe admitted that his broadened definition of science, which encompasses ID, would also embrace astrology. Moreover, defense expert Professor Minnich acknowledged that for ID to be considered science, the ground rules of science have to be broadened to allow consideration of supernatural
The supernatural or is that which is not subject to the laws of nature, or more figuratively, that which is said to exist above and beyond nature...
forces."
- "What is more, defense experts concede that ID is not a theory as that term is defined by the NAS
The National Academy of Sciences is a corporation in the United States whose members serve pro bono as "advisers to the nation on science, engineering, and medicine." As a national academy, new members of the organization are elected annually by current members, based on their distinguished and...
and admit that ID is at best 'fringe scienceFringe science is scientific inquiry in an established field of study that departs significantly from mainstream or orthodox theories, and is classified in the "fringes" of a credible mainstream academic discipline....
' which has achieved no acceptance in the scientific community."
name="p70">s:Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District/4:Whether ID Is Science#Page 70 of 139
- "We therefore find that Professor Behe's claim for irreducible complexity has been refuted in peer-reviewed research papers and has been rejected by the scientific community at large."
name="p79">s:Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District/4:Whether ID Is Science#Page 79 of 139
- "ID proponents primarily argue for design through negative arguments against evolution, as illustrated by Professor Behe’s argument that 'irreducibly complex' systems cannot be produced through Darwinian, or any natural, mechanisms. However, … arguments against evolution are not arguments for design. Expert testimony revealed that just because scientists cannot explain today how biological systems evolved does not mean that they cannot, and will not, be able to explain them tomorrow. As Dr. Padian aptly noted, 'absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.'… Irreducible complexity is a negative argument against evolution, not proof of design, a point conceded by defense expert Professor Minnich."
- "Professor Behe’s concept of irreducible complexity depends on ignoring ways in which evolution is known to occur. Although Professor Behe is adamant in his definition of irreducible complexity when he says a precursor 'missing a part is by definition nonfunctional,' what he obviously means is that it will not function in the same way the system functions when all the parts are present. For example in the case of the bacterial flagellum, removal of a part may prevent it from acting as a rotary motor. However, Professor Behe excludes, by definition, the possibility that a precursor to the bacterial flagellum functioned not as a rotary motor, but in some other way, for example as a secretory system."
- "Professor Behe has applied the concept of irreducible complexity to only a few select systems: (1) the bacterial flagellum
A flagellum is a tail-like projection that protrudes from the cell body of certain prokaryotic and eukaryotic cells, and plays the dual role of locomotion and sense organ, being sensitive to chemicals and temperatures outside the cell. There are some notable differences between prokaryotic and...
; (2) the blood-clotting cascadeA biochemical cascade is a series of chemical reactions in which the products of one reaction are consumed in the next reaction. There are several important biochemical cascade reactions in biochemistry, including the enzymatic cascades, such as the coagulation cascade and the complement system,...
; and (3) the immune systemAn immune system is a system of biological structures and processes within an organism that protects against disease by identifying and killing pathogens and tumor cells. It detects a wide variety of agents, from viruses to parasitic worms, and needs to distinguish them from the organism's own...
. Contrary to Professor Behe’s assertions with respect to these few biochemical systems among the myriad existing in nature, however, Dr. Miller presented evidence, based upon peer-reviewed studies, that they are not, in fact, irreducibly complex."
- "In fact, on cross-examination, Professor Behe was questioned concerning his 1996 claim that science would never find an evolutionary explanation for the immune system. He was presented with fiftyeight peer-reviewed publications, nine books, and several immunology textbook chapters about the evolution of the immune system; however, he simply insisted that this was still not sufficient evidence of evolution, and that it was not "good enough."
- "With ID, proponents assert that they refuse to propose hypotheses on the designer’s identity, do not propose a mechanism, and the designer, he/she/it/they, has never been seen. ... In addition, Professor Behe agreed that for the design of human artifacts, we know the designer and its attributes and we have a baseline for human design that does not exist for design of biological systems. Professor Behe’s only response to these seemingly insurmountable points of disanalogy was that the inference still works in science fiction
Science fiction is a genre of fiction dealing with imaginary but more or less plausible content such as future settings, futuristic science and technology, space travel, aliens, and paranormal abilities...
movies."
Jones would later say that Eric Rothschild's cross examination of Behe was "as good a cross-examination of an expert witness as I have ever seen. It was textbook".
ACSI v. Roman Sterns
Behe received $20,000 for testifying as an expert witness on behalf of the plaintiffs in
Association of Christian Schools International v. Roman Sterns. The case was filed by
Association of Christian Schools InternationalThe Association of Christian Schools International is an association of evangelical Protestant Christian schools.-Purposes:ACSI, a protestant association for Christian schools, impacts nearly 23,000 schools and transforms the lives of more than 3.9 million students worldwide...
, which argued that the
University of CaliforniaThe University of California is a public university system in the U.S. state of California. Under the California Master Plan for Higher Education, the University of California is a part of the state's three-tier public higher education system, which also includes the California State University...
was being discriminatory by not recognizing science classes that use creationist books. The 2005 filing claimed that University of California's rejection of several of their courses was illegal "viewpoint discrimination and content regulation prohibited by the Free Speech Clause." In 2007, Behe's expert witness report claimed that the Christian textbooks, including
Biology for Christian SchoolsBiology for Christian Schools is a controversial 1991 school-level textbook written by William S. Pinkston and published by the Bob Jones University Press. It espouses the idea of Biblical inerrancy; that whenever science and Christianity conflicts, science is wrong...
, are excellent works for high school students. He defended that view in a deposition. In August 2008, Judge S. James Otero rejected Behe's claims, saying that Behe "submitted a declaration concluding that the BJU
[Bob Jones University PressBJU Press , founded in 1973, publishes textbooks for the Christian school and home school movements as well as trade and children's books.-History:...
] text mentions standard scientific content. ... However, Professor Behe 'did not consider how much detail or depth' the texts gave to this standard content." Otero ruled in favor of the University of California's decision to reject courses using these books.
Books
- Darwin's Black Box
Darwin's Black Box: The Biochemical Challenge to Evolution is a book written by Michael J. Behe and published by Free Press in which he presents his notion of irreducible complexity and claims that its presence in many biochemical systems indicates therefore that they must be the result of...
. Free PressFree Press is a book publishing imprint of Simon and Schuster. It was founded by Jeremiah Kaplan and Charles Liebman in 1947 and was devoted to sociology and religion titles. It was headquartered in Glencoe, Illinois, where it was known as The Free Press of Glencoe...
, 1996. ISBN 0-684-83493-6. See Scanned copy (not all pages included) and reviews at Google books
- Science and Evidence for Design in the Universe (Proceedings of the Wethersfield Institute), September 25, 1999. ISBN 0-89870-809-5
- The Edge of Evolution
The Edge of Evolution: The Search for the Limits of Darwinism is a book promoting intelligent design by Discovery Institute fellow Michael Behe, published by the Free Press in 2007...
. Free PressFree Press is a book publishing imprint of Simon and Schuster. It was founded by Jeremiah Kaplan and Charles Liebman in 1947 and was devoted to sociology and religion titles. It was headquartered in Glencoe, Illinois, where it was known as The Free Press of Glencoe...
, June 2007. ISBN 0-7432-9620-6
Videos
- Flock of Dodos
Flock of Dodos: The Evolution-Intelligent Design Circus is a documentary film by American marine biologist and filmmaker Randy Olson. It highlights the debate between proponents of the concept of intelligent design and the scientific consensus that supports evolution.The documentary was first...
. New Video, (2007) ISBN 0-7670-9819-6
- Intelligent Design: From the Big Bang to Irreducible Complexity
- Irreducible Complexity: The Biochemical Challenge to Darwinian Theory
- Unlocking the Mystery of Life
Unlocking the Mystery of Life is a 2002 intelligent design documentary film promoted and produced by the Illustra Media, a branch of the Discovery Institute, and Focus on the Family. The film's script was written by Stephen C...
2002
- Where Does the Evidence Lead? 2004
- Michael Behe on Colbert Report 2007
External links
- Michael Behe Biography from Lehigh University
Lehigh University is a private, co-educational university located in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, in the Lehigh Valley region of the United States. It was established in 1865 by Asa Packer as a four-year technical school, but has grown to include studies in a wide variety of disciplines...
- Michael Behe Biography from the Discovery Institute
The Discovery Institute is a non-profit public policy think tank based in Seattle, Washington, best known for its advocacy of intelligent design...
- Michael Behe Biography from the Access Research Network
Access Research Network , based in Colorado Springs, Colorado, evolved from an earlier creationist organization, Students for Origins Research . SOR was founded in 1977 by a group of students at the University of California at Santa Barbara as an "alternative view" to both the Young Earth...
- Irreducible Complexity and Michael Behe on intelligent design from the TalkOrigins Archive
The TalkOrigins Archive is a website that presents mainstream science perspectives on the antievolution claims of young-earth, old-earth, and "intelligent design" creationists...
Reviews