I suggest you come up with a more meaningful response. I've explained the distinction between using "peer-review" in a general context and in an academic context. You have not presented anything to suggest that you understand the distinction being presented.

So looks like the Discovery Institute which is well known for trying to get ID into schools started the Biologic Institute which has the purpose of trying to provide scientific trappings behind ID. The Bio-Complexity journal is essentially pretending to be a legitimate journal but is entirely created and funded by a group out to promote ID. This isn't hidden, it is in their editorial policies: "BIO-Complexity is a peer-reviewed scientific journal with a unique goal. It aims to be the leading forum for testing the scientific merit of the claim that intelligent design (ID) is a credible explanation for life. " The irony is that it is an entirely failed journal that doesn't actually publish much of anything. The whole claim that there is all this research out there that just can't make it into Science and Nature because those journals are biased against them doesn't hold out because here is a fake journal biased FOR them and they can't even publish any reasonable amount of research.

Do we really need to wade through the out pile to check and see if garbage in got rainbows out?

okay fined skimmed the OP. The conclusion is nonsense, it is a semantic bait and switch. It falsely implies that "neo-darwinism" singularly means things that come from DNA. Then he notes that hey look, science has shown us a whole bunch of cool new epigenetic factors, changes that don't from DNA, things like micro RNA (which my brother works with in his lab, incidentally) and the like. Since we have defined neo-darwinism as exclusively DNA, and scientists other than him have shown DNA is not the singular factor that affects development, ergo the thing you ridiculously defined is ridiculous. Of course, epigenetics do get incorporated into the modern evolutionary synthesis and do not present an iota of a problem for evolution.

For what it is worth, I don't have a problem with creationists using the term "neo-Darwinism." There is a recognizable group of prominent defenders of evolution that use that term (e.g. Jerry Coyne, Richard Dawkins) to describe their own view of evolution.

The "scientific conspiracy" bugbear that creationists routinely imply or openly use as an excuse for why virtually no-one with relevant qualifications wants a bar of I.D. is obvious nonsense. Since, you know, any scientist who could successfully demonstrate a more probable mechanism for evolution than the current paradigm would literally be the most famous and pivotal figure of the 21st century.

ya it isn't neo darwinism that is necessarily bad, but the abuse of that term to mean that DNA is the be all and end all and that any signs of epigenetics or whatever else disproves neo darwinism by definition.

Are you guys saying that people are trying to link creationism and epigenetics? Can someone explain how this would be possible?

What is being said is that a bunch of well known creationists have created a "journal" where they enjoy being both the editorial board and the published authors.

But okay, I will play your game. Here is a review of the article:

About the author:


The specific article in question is a literary review that references completely arbitrarily between the 1920s and 2010s. We are talking about near 450 references over about 16 pages of text. Doing a thorough analysis of this is pretty much impossible, something I also suspect is what the author wants. I did, however, do about a dozen spot checks.

The referenced articles vary in both content and scope, there seems to be little pattern as to why they are selected. There is a strange mix of recent much cited articles and very old obscure articles, but the author never gives a good explanation as to why a specific reference is being used, nor does Wells ever seem to give a good description of what his referenced material is about.

For a summary review this is very bad form, as a summary review should both thoroughly specify what is the scope of the literature it includes, why it is being included and it should also discuss - not only conclude - what specific implications this has for the subject matter.

The conclusion seems to bear very little relation to the theoretical summary, and the language is hazy when referencing and specific when concluding. The tendency to haphazardly reference articles over a near 100-year timespan makes it very difficult to see that the authors conclusions of necessary implications for the field are true.

You're implying that I've sided with this author or the article or something.

What I meant was that epigenetics would potentially speed up evolution. Even though that would threaten modern evolutionary synthesis, it's even more threatening to creationism. At least that's how I see it..

I have not said anything about what you have or have not "sided with." My post was about the article and the author, and only about the author and article.

And there is nothing about epigenetics that threatens "modern evolutionary synthesis", unless that term means something radically different than it should.

As a very minor aside to your otherwise excellent post, this by itself isn't that bad. My own work frequently references stuff from the 1950s and 1960s as well as stuff from the the last decade. It is just a function that the foundational concepts were all done a half century ago but the field experienced a jump in the last decade as people had cause to be motivated in using those older techniques again.

I agree with that sentiment, and old material can often be both solid, relevant and not least interesting. Many times a good literary summary of older research can actually be superior to conducting a solitary study; superior conclusions for half the resources.

In an article that concludes where an entire field should be headed in terms of research however, like the one Wells is writing here, I think the focus should be on establishing a summary of where the field is actually at - not haphazardly using old and new material side by side and never really explaining the relevance of either.

There is a non physical mechanism that science is unaware of for obvious reasons. I became aware of it a few years ago.

http://phenomena.nationalgeographic....e-epigenetics/

When I read about this mice experiment, it validated the realizations I had already had independently. All I'm saying is don't be so quick to dismiss this stuff. I'm not the type of person to make big claims carelessly.

What exactly is it I am supposed to have "dismissed"? And please be precise, as this is annoying. All I have done is dismiss Bio-Complexity as a hack journal and Wells' article as a very poorly written summary review with unsupported conclusions.

I have no idea where "non-physical" comes from. This is a term you brought to the debate. There is nothing in your link about this.

Okay then I misunderstood what I quoted in my last post. I'm fine with dismissing the article in the OP. I don't know why you directed that at me though.

wat

I'd make a longer post, but it's pretty clear festeringzit and craig1120 don't understand a word of the articles they mistakenly believe undermine modern evolutionary theory.

My understanding is not based on those articles but that's fine - I'm not going to get into a back and forth that goes no where. At this point, I've given up attempting to encourage people on this forum to pursue or be open to the idea of understanding reality in another way which was my main motivation for posting here.

maybe if you actually explain what your "idea of understanding reality" is, rather than dropping hints, and being mysterious, people would be able to respond more?

This is not my sense of it. I could make a long recap post but I don't think that would change anything.

I'd make a longer post, but it's pretty clear that the above post added absolutely nothing to the thread.

It's not a recap if you haven't explained it yet

I've never been able to decipher your stand either. The only thing you've explicitly said that I can recall is that you take the bible to be completely metaphorical, and that ego gets in the way of the atheist and theist pursuing truth, and if we were to push through we would reach some other level of understanding.

I'm not completely convinced that you have a concrete world-view, or perhaps you are worried that if you explicitly state it, you'll be at risk of having it criticized.

Here is a post in which I talk about my world-view:

http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/sh...1&postcount=12

My world view is based on my experiences. Unless people have had at least some of the experiences I've had, they won't be interested when I'm talking about intuition, expanding awareness, separating from ego, etc. And unless they have dissatisfaction they won't step into the unknown to have these experiences. I already knew this when I started posting so it's all good. I just wanted to see what would happen because I am going to be writing a book at some point and sharing more that I haven't talked about yet. And yes I try to be careful because this stuff is not mainstream and it can be offensive when people have their core beliefs challenged.

You say in the post that you linked to,

This is just a story. I would bet you have never had an experience of "soul", never seen, felt or experienced one in any way, have no evidence for one. So no, your world view is not based on your experiences. Based on stories about your experiences, maybe.

There is no "who" that you truly are

who or what would be separating from the ego? Is there even such a thing as ego?