Tag: CELS conference

Cell membrane, lipid bilayer, digital illustration of a diffusion of liquid molecules through cell membrane, microscopic view of a cell membrane, biology background, medical background

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Author
Howard Glicksman

Date
August 7, 2023

Tagged
, cellular life, CELS conference, chemical balance, chemical evolution, Conference on Engineering in Living Systems, Darwinian Evolution, Darwinian gradualism, diffusion, engineer, engineering, Evolution, friction, heat transfer, human death, human life, Intelligent Design, living systems, Molecular Machines, Natural Selection, osmosis, potassium, sodium pumps, survival}

The Innovative Cellular Engineering That Keeps Us Alive

_{Howard Glicksman

August 7, 2023

Uncategorized}

When left to their own devices, the laws of nature tend toward death, not life. So what does it take for life to exist? On this ID The Future, host Eric Anderson talks with physician Howard Glicksman about some of the remarkable engineering challenges that have to be solved to produce and maintain living organisms such as ourselves. Glicksman is co-author with systems engineer Steve Laufmann of the recent book Your Designed Body, an exploration of the extraordinary system of systems that encompasses thousands of ingenious and interdependent engineering solutions to keep us alive and ticking. In the "just so" stories of the Darwinian narrative, these engineering solutions simply evolved. They emerged and got conserved. Voila! But in this chat, Anderson and Glicksman explain that it takes more than the laws of nature to keep us from dying. "Chemicals on their own don't have any desire or tendency to turn into living organisms," says Anderson. "They tend to degrade, they tend to break down, they tend to go back to their basic constituents." Glicksman and Anderson discuss examples, including how the human body handles friction, heat transfer, and the crucial task of maintaining chemical balance at the cellular level. And where does all this essential innovation come from? Glicksman points to an intelligent cause that transcends matter and energy. Read More ›

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Author
Stuart Burgess

Date
July 12, 2023

Tagged
, beaked whale, CELS conference, common descent, common design, Conference on Engineering in Living Systems, constrained optimization, engineering trade-offs, flipper, flipper anatomy, Homology, humpback whale, marsupial rats, pentadactyl design, pentadactyl limb, placental rats, protein structures, systems biology, vestigial body parts, whale fin, whale pelvic bones, whales}

The Pentadactyl Whale Flipper: An Engineering Masterstroke

_{Stuart Burgess

July 12, 2023

Uncategorized}

Does the five-digit design of the whale flipper, curiously akin to the five-digit design of so many different kinds of animal limbs, point to evolutionary common descent? That was Charles Darwin’s argument, and the argument is a staple of high school and college biology textbooks. But no, says distinguished British engineer Stuart Burgess on today’s ID the Future in his conversation with host Eric Anderson. The repeated recurrence of the pentadactyl form is better explained by reference to the idea of common design. That is, a master designer reused the pentadactyl design theme because it achieves an optimal trade-off between strength on the one hand (no pun intended) and suppleness or dexterity on the other. And yes, Burgess says, the giant flipper on a whale needs to be not just incredibly strong but also supple to allow the whale to maneuver adroitly through the water. This reuse of a good design concept shouldn’t surprise us, Burgess says. Just as human engineers reuse the concepts of the wheel, axle, nut and bolt, or pulley, so too the designer of life reuses shrewd engineering solutions in widely different applications, in each case adapting the design concept for the particular use. Burgess also rebuts the claim that whales have vestigial pelvic bones from a land-dwelling ancestor. He then moves from the big to the small, pointing to more positive evidence in favor of common design (over Darwinian common descent) in marsupial and placental rats and in a protein machine best known for one job but that has been found to “moonlight” doing a very different job in a very different biological context. Tune in to hear Burgess unpack the full argument. The conversation took place at the 2023 Conference on Engineering in Living Systems (CELS) in Denton, Texas. Read More ›

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Author
Eric H. Anderson

Date
June 26, 2023

Tagged
, adaptation, biology, CELS conference, Charles Darwin, Darwinian Evolution, Darwinism, engineered systems, engineering, engineering principles, Evolution, finch beaks, fitness landscape, function, living systems, macroevolution, Microevolution, mutations, Natural Selection, peppered moths, random mutations}

Is Adaptation Actually a Fight to Stay the Same?

_{Eric H. Anderson

June 26, 2023

Uncategorized}

On this ID The Future, host Casey Luskin talks with Eric Anderson on location at this year's Conference on Engineering and Living Systems (CELS). The two discuss an intriguing new engineering-based model of bounded adaptation that could dramatically change how we view small-scale evolutionary changes within populations of organisms. In presenting his argument for natural selection, Charles Darwin pointed to small changes like finch beak size and peppered moth color as visible evidence of an unguided evolutionary process at work. Many have adopted this perspective, quick to grant the Darwinian mechanism credit for micro, if not macro, evolution. But Anderson and other attendees of the CELS conference are starting to promote a different view. "We need to stop saying organisms are partly designed," says Anderson. "We need to view them as deeply designed and purposeful, active and engaged in their environments, and capable of adapting within their operating parameters." Tune in to get a fascinating glimpse of this novel approach to biology. Read More ›

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Author
Brian Miller

Date
January 10, 2022

Tagged
, Brian Miller, Casey Luskin, CELS conference, cichlid fish, Conference on Engineering in Living Systems, Darwinism, design logic, engineering, Evolution, finch beak, finches, fitness landscape, four-bar linkage, fruit flies, gravity well model for adaptation, Intelligent Design, intelligent design predictions, labrid fish, Mark W. Westneat, mutational hotspots, Natural Selection, Neo-Darwinism, phenotypic plasticity, population genetics, random variation, stickleback fish, Systematic Biology, systems biology, tracking model for adaptation}

Engineers Crash the Evolution Party, Rethink Biological Variation

_{Brian Miller

January 10, 2022

Uncategorized}

On today’s ID the Future, physicist and engineer Brian Miller sits down with host Casey Luskin to survey exciting developments in intelligent design research that are driven by an engineering model for understanding and studying variations in species. ID researchers are pushing this work, but so too are systems biology researchers outside the intelligent design community. Tune in to hear Miller and Luskin discuss everything from fruit flies, finch beaks, and stickleback fish to mutational hotspots, phenotypic plasticity, and the gravity well model of biological adaptation.

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Author
Dustin Van Hofwegen

Date
June 14, 2021

Tagged
, adaptation mechanisms, antibiotic resistance, bacterial flagellum, CELS conference, citric acid, citric acid cycle, Conference on Engineering in Living Systems, control systems, Darwin Devolves, devolution, Dustin Van Hofwegen, E. coli, Intelligent Design, long-term evolution experiment, Michael Behe, Michigan State University, promoters, Rapid Evolution of Citrate Utilization, regulators, reverse engineering, Richard Lenski, Scott Minnich, systems biology, systems engineering, transporters, University of Idaho}

Dustin Van Hofwegen on Engineering and Evolution in Lilliput

_{Dustin Van Hofwegen

June 14, 2021

Uncategorized}

On today’s ID the Future we go behind the scenes at the recent Conference on Engineering in Living Systems, where host Jonathan Witt sat down with Dustin Van Hofwegen, a biology professor at Azusa Pacific University in California. The two discuss the private conference, which brought together biologists and engineers to study how engineering principles and a design perspective can and are being applied to biology — to plants and animals but also to Van Hofwegen’s area of focus, the Lilliputian realm of microbial biology. The two quickly move into a conversation about Van Hofwegen’s article in the Journal of Bacteriology, co-authored with Carolyn Hovde and Scott Minnich, based on research they did at the University of Idaho. As Van Read More ›