Vladimir Nabokov, Lepidopterist and Darwin-doubter, Has Expertise Vindicated. Novelist and lepidopterist Vladimir Nabokov had "furious" Darwin-doubts, so he himself forthrightly said. Back in the 1940s Nabokov was the de facto curator of Harvard's butterfly collection, writing widely in scientific journals before he became better known for novels like Pnin, Pale Fire, and Lolita.
How delightful that his scientific insight and expertise have now been impressively demonstrated, as the New York Times reports. The article doesn't mention Nabokov's doubt -- or rather, his flat-out denial -- that Darwinian natural selection could select for aspects of butterfly coloration that are evidently aesthetic or decorative in nature rather than serving any practical purpose of benefit to the butterfly (as opposed to the human observer).
Instead, the focus is on Nabokov's published speculation on the evolutionary ancestry of the butterfly genus he studied most intensively, the Polyommatus blues. The mysteries of mimicry had a special attraction for me. Evolution News & Views: Peer-Reviewed Pro-Intelligent Design Article Endorses Irreducible Complexity. In a peer-reviewed paper titled "Evidence of Design in Bird Feathers and Avian Respiration," in International Journal of Design & Nature and Ecodynamics, Leeds University professor Andy McIntosh argues that two systems vital to bird flight--feathers and the avian respiratory system--exhibit "irreducible complexity. " The paper describes these systems using the exact sort of definitions that Michael Behe uses to describe irreducible complexity: [F]unctional systems, in order to operate as working machines, must have all the required parts in place in order to be effective.
If one part is missing, then the whole system is useless. The inference of design is the most natural step when presented with evidence such as in this paper, that is evidence concerning avian feathers and respiration. Regarding the structure of feathers, he argues that they require many features present in order to properly function and allow flight: Evolution News & Views: Intelligent Design explains and unifies data from across the spectrum of scientific fields. Oxford Mathematician John Lennox Weighs-In On Stephen Hawking’s Recent Claim That The Universe Came From Nothing Through The Laws Of Nature.
Home » Culture, Education, Intelligent Design, Religion, Science » Oxford Mathematician John Lennox Weighs-In On Stephen Hawking’s Recent Claim That The Universe Came From Nothing Through The Laws Of Nature There’s no denying that Stephen Hawking is intellectually bold as well as physically heroic. And in his latest book, the renowned physicist mounts an audacious challenge to the traditional religious belief in the divine creation of the universe…The Big Bang, he argues, was the inevitable consequence of these laws [of physics] ‘because there is a law such as gravity, the universe can and will create itself from nothing.’ Unfortunately, while Hawking’s argument is being hailed as controversial and ground-breaking, it is hardly new.
Writes John Lennox, Oxford Professor of Mathematics, in an article at dailymail.co.uk in response to Hawking’s recent claim that the laws of physics, such as gravity, will spawn a universe such as ours. That is a confusion of category. + Science and Values. John Lennox. John Carson Lennox is a British mathematician, philosopher of science and Christian apologist who is Professor of Mathematics[1] at the University of Oxford. He is a Fellow in Mathematics and Philosophy of Science at Green Templeton College, Oxford University. He is also Pastoral Advisor of Green Templeton College and Fellow of Wycliffe Hall. He is a leading voice explaining the relationship between science and religion. Early life[edit] Career[edit] Lennox has been part of numerous public debates defending the Christian faith, including debates with Christopher Hitchens, Michael Shermer, Richard Dawkins, Lawrence Krauss, Michael Tooley, Stephen Law, and Peter Singer. Lennox also teaches science and religion in the University of Oxford.
Debates[edit] Lennox is a Christian academic and has participated in a number of public debates against individuals including Richard Dawkins, Christopher Hitchens, Lawrence Krauss and Michael Shermer. Personal life[edit] Works[edit] References[edit] Computational Intelligence and Darwinism. This UD post got me to thinking. I do that from time to time. On the subject of computational intelligence I have some minor credentials, including a Silver Medal at the first Computer Olympiad in London, sponsored by David Levy of chess fame.
You can access the final results of my research and efforts in computational artificial intelligence (AI) here: If you have a computer with sufficient memory and disk space you can explore the only perfect-play endgame algorithm ever invented for the game of checkers (known as draughts in the UK). It was my exploration into computational AI that initially caused me to have doubts about the creative powers of the Darwinian mechanism, which I now consider to be a transparent absurdity as an explanation for almost anything of any significance, and certainly not as an explanation for human intelligence. Here’s why. A human player might say, “Hmmm, if I move here, this will create a positional weakness from which the opponent cannot possibly recover.” John Polkinghorne. The Rev Dr John Charlton Polkinghorne, KBE, FRS (born 16 October 1930) is an English theoretical physicist, theologian, writer, and Anglican priest.
A prominent and leading voice explaining the relationship between science and religion, he was professor of Mathematical physics at the University of Cambridge from 1968 to 1979, when he resigned his chair to study for the priesthood, becoming an ordained Anglican priest in 1982. He served as the president of Queens' College, Cambridge from 1988 until 1996.
Polkinghorne is the author of five books on physics, and 26 on the relationship between science and religion; his publications include The Quantum World (1989), Quantum Physics and Theology: An Unexpected Kinship (2005), Exploring Reality: The Intertwining of Science and Religion (2007), and Questions of Truth (2009).[1] The Polkinghorne Reader (edited by Thomas Jay Oord) provides key excerpts from Polkinghorne's most influential books. Early life and education[edit] Career[edit] Can DNA Prove the Existence of an Intelligent Designer? « Biola Magazine.