On November 30, 2009, Michael Shermer and Don Prothero debated Stephen Meyer and Richard Sternberg on this question: "Has Evolutionary Theory Adequately Explained the Origins of Life?" Shermer/Prothero of course took the affirmative, and Meyer/Sternberg the negative.
Who won this debate? For my surprise answer skip forward to the end of this message.
Of course, evolution is not a theory of life's origins, but it was evidently understood, at least by Shermer and Prothero, that the debate was to be about the sufficiency of evolutionary-style mechanisms to explain life's origins.
Some of you are probably thinking, "Sternberg, Sternberg. Why is that name so familiar?" Well, it was just a few years ago that Richard Sternberg in his capacity as managing editor of the journal of the Biological Society of Washington published a paper on intelligent design by Stephen Meyer, his partner in this debate. Some of you might recall Sternberg's denials that he was an IDist and that he was just being objective by including all legitimately scientific work regardless of perspective, and now here he is finally out in the open fully aligned with the IDists of the Discovery Institute. Can you say "dissembling?" Oh, heck, why beat around the bush? "Lying" is the more accurate term.
I tried to refresh my memory of Sternberg's version of events by visiting his website (
Forbidden!), but he's changed the organization (for the better), and I couldn't find passages I thought I remembered. But there's a link to a letter he wrote to
The Scientist (
Forbidden!) where he cagily dances around the issue of whether he's an IDist by stating that accusations that he's a creationist are wrong, ignoring that obviously the criticism came from people who were lumping creationists and IDists together.
Sternberg has received much encouragement and support from the ID community, and all I can say is that people who hear cheers when they lie are likely to continue lying.
By the way, when the Sternberg controversy erupted in 2004 I predicted that Sternberg would become unemployable in his chosen field, and guess what? I was right. Sternberg has maintained his status as an unpaid collaborator at the Smithsonian, but he's now employed by the Biologic Institute, a fully owned subsidiary of the Discovery Institute. Sternberg published Meyer's paper and ruined his career, and now Meyer has compensated him by giving him a job. Meyer is now Sternberg's boss.
I first learned of the debate just last night while reading the latest issue of
Skeptic magazine. A two page summary of the debate describes Shermer/Prothero blowing Meyer/Sternberg out of the water, and so this morning I sat down at my computer to see what more I could find out about the debate online. To my surprise, the first link is to a blog describing the debate in precisely opposite terms. This is from
First report on Meyer-Shermer-Sternberg-Prothero debate | WINTERY KNIGHT:
It was all shaping up to be a serious heavyweight bout. And then Meyer and Sternberg simply KO’d the competition in the opening round...To call the debate a massacre would be a discredit to Sitting Bull.
Okay, so who's right? Answering that question requires listening to the debate, about 120 minutes of audio that can be found in two places:
I'm continuing to learn more about the debate, which evidently stirred up emotions on both sides. The American Freedom Alliance who sponsored the debate characterizes itself as a defender of "Western values and ideals," but Prothero calls it a right wing organization (see his comments the morning after the debate at
Battle in Beverly Hills: Reflections on the Prothero/Shermer vs. Meyer/Sternberg "debate," Nov. 30, 2009). Both Shermer and Prothero complained during and after the debate that the ID side had not addressed the topic (the origin of life), but Ari Davis, serving as moderator, allowed this.
But this meant that Shermer and Prothero prepared for the wrong debate, because except for Prothero's opening presentation on the the history and current status of origins of life research, the subject of what was supposedly the debate's topic was completely ignored. Of course Meyer and Sternberg were not surprised since IDists don't care about topic anyway (we see it here all the time) - they talk what they want to talk about, and it's always the same things regardless of topic.
By the way, Ari Davis responded to Prothero's morning-after comments at, no surprise, the Discovery Institute's website (
Avi Davis Responds to Donald Prothero on Beverly Hills Debate | Evolution News), and makes clear that he and the AFA have a clear anti-evolution agenda.
I'm listening to the debate now and will continue writing this review when I'm done...
Okay, it's two hours later, I"m back. In their opening comments both Shermer and Prothero were highly critical of ID as not doing science and not being science. In his own opening comments Meyer began with
ad hominem by saying that Prothero had a command of facts that aren't true, then went on to say that although he'd be happy to debate ID some other time, the topic of this debate was the sufficiency of evolution to explain the history of life. I thought he was going to somehow bring the origins of life into the picture, but he never does.
Sternberg used his presentation to argue that the evolution of the whale could not have followed evolutionary principles because the store of existing variation was insufficient, the mutation rate was too slow, and whale populations were too small. One wonders when Dr. Sternberg is going to present his work in a peer reviewed journal, or if he's going to again raise accusations of a scientific "thought police" as he did in his letter to
Nature (
Forbidden!). But even more than that one wonders why Dr. Sternberg prepared a presentation on whale evolution for a debate on the sufficiency of evolutionary principles to explain the origin of life.
In other words, why did Dr. Sternberg come prepared to discuss what the moderator, AFA president Ari Davis, allowed to be discussed, and not the topic of the debate. I share Dr. Prothero's suspicion of behind-the-scenes chicanery, but believe it happened not by plan but simply due to shared viewpoints.
The pinnacle of the evolution side's rebuttal arguably occurs at 59 or 60 minutes when Shermer launches direct questions at Meyer and Sternberg about just how many acts of creation they're talking about. Paraphrasing Shermer, was it 10 acts of creation per million years? 100? 1000? Was each species specially created with subspecies created through evolution? Is every beneficial mutation an act of creation? Inquiring minds want to know.
The 60 minute mark is also where things get real interesting. I'd advise skipping the first hour of the debate because it's arguments we've heard from both sides many times. The rebuttal begins at 60 minutes, and the moderator allows the two sides to direct their questions and answers directly at each other, something very rare in formal debates where the debaters usually address their arguments to the audience, and where direct interactions between participants are kept to a minimum.
So the debate turned into one pretty good dust-up of a discussion. I highly recommend beginning your listening at the 60 minute mark. You can go back later and fill in the blanks.
So who won the debate? The big winner was Richard Sternberg, hands down. I think he must be internally conflicted and/or unaware of the true reasons behind his rejection of mainstream evolutionary explanations, and I further think that those reasons can only be religious or at least spiritual, otherwise an alliance (and employment) with the Discovery Institute would make no sense, but he was intelligent, informed, articulate, and spoke and presented his thoughts and ideas far better than any other participant.
The big loser? Don Prothero. I agree with the IDist summaries that he was overly aggressive and did not comport himself well, and I also agree that Sternberg appeared to be more informed on biological matters. Debate is a skill that has nothing to do with knowledge and intelligence.
Which side won the debate? If I postulate an unbiased audience observer who is intelligent but as uninformed about science as your average layperson, then Meyer and Sternberg handily won the debate for the ID side.
--Percy
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