Evolution

On this episode of ID the Future, guest host Robert J. Marks talks with Dr. Winston Ewert about Ewert’s groundbreaking new hypothesis challenging Darwin’s common descent tree of life. The new model is based on the well-established technique of repurposing software code in different software projects. Ewert, a senior researcher at Biologic and the Evolutionary Informatics Lab, describes the nested hierarchical pattern of life and how any credible theory of life’s origin and diversity must explain it. He then describes how Darwin’s basic theory fits, and doesn’t fit, the pattern, and the various ancillary mechanisms invoked to close the gaps. These patches include horizontal gene transfer, convergent evolution, and incomplete lineage sorting. Ewert then cues up what he argues is a better, more elegant hypothesis, the common design hypothesis laid out in his peer-reviewed technical paper available here.

On this episode of ID the Future, host Sarah Chaffee speaks with physician and author Dr. Geoffrey Simmons about nature’s foresight. Engineers designing a car have to plan for all kinds of conditions the car might encounter for the car to be successful. Something like this also appears to be necessary for organisms — including the human organism, as Dr. Simmons argues in a recent Evolution News article. Blind natural forces, he argues, don’t have what it takes. Instead it requires real foresight, a hallmark of intelligent design.

On this episode of ID the Future, CSC Associate Director John West exposes the darker side of P.T. Barnum. Maybe you’ve watched The Greatest Showman – but have you heard of Barnum’s “What Is It?” exhibit? Listen in for more about racist displays of human “freaks” and how the science of the day endorsed Social Darwinism. For more, watch the newly released documentary, Human Zoos, and visit HumanZoos.org. Please consider donating to support the IDTF Podcast.

On this episode of ID the Future, Father Michael Chaberek, author of the books Catholicism and Evolution and Aquinas and Evolution, explains why the theory of intelligent design meshes well with the philosophy of Thomas Aquinas. In his conversation with host Jay Richards, Chaberek, creator of the site Aquinas.Design, notes that some Thomists complain about ID, but he argues that they misunderstand what ID is and isn’t. As for criticism that ID is a “God of the Gaps” argument, Chaberek urges Thomists to consider where that complaint leads: For Catholics, and Christians generally, that complaint proves way too much, he argues.

On this episode of ID the Future, host Jay Richards talks with Fr. Michael Chaberek about Charles Darwin and medieval scholar Thomas Aquinas, one of the most influential of all Western philosophers, and especially central in Roman Catholic thinking. Many Catholic scholars support neo-Darwinism and insist that Aquinas’s work nicely harmonizes with neo-Darwinism. Chaberek, author of the recent book Aquinas and Evolution, and creator of the new website Aquinas.design, offers several reasons to conclude otherwise.

On this episode of ID the Future historian Michael Flannery continues discussion of his new book Nature’s Prophet: Alfred Russel Wallace and His Evolution from Natural Selection to Natural Theology. Flannery tells how Wallace became convinced of some “overruling intelligence” in nature — not because of “gaps” in what he knew, but because so many human attributes demand a better explanation than Darwin’s own “utility principle.” They called for a cause adequate to the effects. Please consider donating to support the IDTF Podcast.

On this episode of ID the Future, historian Michael Flannery discusses his just-released book Nature’s Prophet: Alfred Russel Wallace and His Evolution from Natural Selection to Natural Theology. It’s the intellectual history of Wallace, who is credited with independently propounding the the theory of evolution by natural selection. Darwin insisted on a purely materialistic version of the theory, but as Wallace studied the evidence, he grew convinced that intelligent design also played a role in the history of life, particularly in the origin of humans. Though not a religious person, he broke with the rising scientism of his day to argue that there must be some “overruling intelligence” behind nature.

On this episode of ID the Future, Robert Crowther talks with author Jay Richards about Richards’ new book The Human Advantage: The Future of American Work in an Age of Smart Machines. Science fiction tantalizes us — and pundits terrorize us — with images of  intelligent machines taking over for humans. Really taking over, as in replacing us. Some thinkers even say that’s just the next phase, since we’re machines ourselves. Jay Richards explains how that’s wrong, and there’s a lot more to hope for than to fear in our future with our new smart machines.

Today’s episode of ID the Future features “In the Market” radio host Janet Parshall interviewing Center for Science and Culture senior fellow Jonathan Witt, co-author of the recent book Heretic: One Scientist’s Journey from Darwin to Design. Witt and Parshall discuss the book Heretic, some brave anti-Darwin heretics, and a recent scholarly study claiming to show that greater science education and science literacy encourages acceptance of evolution. Witt highlights what he sees as some glaring problems in the study’s survey, and in the way Darwinian evolution is normally taught.

On this episode of ID the Future, Pr. Emeritus Michael Flannery (U of Alabama-Birmingham) continues his discussion of evolutionist Kenneth Miller’s recent book The Human Instinct: How We Evolved to Have Reason, Consciousness, and Free Will. Flannery suggests that Miller’s “theistic evolution” is more precisely Darwinian theism — and that such a marriage is as ultimately hopeless as squaring the proverbial circle.