An Elsevier journal has disavowed, but not yet retracted, a paper creationists are calling a “a big deal for the mainstreaming” of intelligent design.
The article, “Using statistical methods to model the fine-tuning of molecular machines and systems,” appeared in the September issue of the Journal of Theoretical Biology, but has been online since June. Authors Steinar Thorvaldsen, of the University of Tromsø, Norway, and Ola Hössjer, a mathematician at Stockholm University in Sweden, write:
Fine-tuning has received much attention in physics, and it states that the fundamental constants of physics are finely tuned to precise values for a rich chemistry and life permittance. It has not yet been applied in a broad manner to molecular biology. However, in this paper we argue that biological systems present fine-tuning at different levels, e.g. functional proteins, complex biochemical machines in living cells, and cellular networks. This paper describes molecular fine-tuning, how it can be used in biology, and how it challenges conventional Darwinian thinking. We also discuss the statistical methods underpinning fine-tuning and present a framework for such analysis.
According to the journal, Thorvaldsen and Hössjer not only failed to disclose their links to creationists (more on that in a second), but they actively hid their work’s adjacency to intelligent design by leaving that phrase out of their keywords until after the editing process was complete.
As it happens, Thorvaldsen is well-known to creationists, particularly the Discovery Institute, which has included his work in a bibliography of what it considers to be research supportive of its cause.
Meanwhile, Thorvaldsen is the head of an outfit called BioCosmos, which doles out money to people who push intelligent design. Last November, BioCosmos received a $1.6 million grant from Einar Johan Rasmussen, a Norweigian executive partial to the cause, according to this article in Uncommon Descent, a creationist website. The article states that:
Thorvaldsen is also head of the Norwegian branch of Origo, an evolution-critical magazine and publishing company, a collaboration between Danish and Norwegian evolution sceptics and ID proponents.
In a rebuttal to the article published by the journal, Joseph Lachance and colleagues at the Georgia Institute of Technology wrote that the claims in the paper are neither new nor accurate:
neither fine-tuning nor intelligent design is required when sample spaces are viewed through the lens of evolutionary dynamics.
Notably, the authors of this paper list “Intelligent Design” as a keyword and repeatedly return to the idea of irreducible complexity, a hallmark of creationism. These ideas have been repeatedly debunked in the past. In the words of Carl Sagan: “extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence”, a threshold that is not met in this paper.
The journal has now issued a disclaimer from its three editors, which states:
The Journal of Theoretical Biology and its co-Chief Editors do not endorse in any way the ideology of nor reasoning behind the concept of intelligent design. Since the publication of the paper it has now become evident that the authors are connected to a creationist group (although their addresses are given on the paper as departments in bona fide universities). We were unaware of this fact while the paper was being reviewed. Moreover, the keywords “intelligent design” were added by the authors after the review process during the proofing stage and we were unaware of this action by the authors. We have removed these from the online version of this paper. We believe that intelligent design is not in any way a suitable topic for the Journal of Theoretical Biology.
We emailed one of the editors to find out why the journal has not retracted the paper — which it seems it could do on the grounds of undeclared conflicts of interest if it didn’t want to mess with the content itself. (Journals tend to go that route — finding a technicality instead of engaging with the real issues — when they publish something embarrassing, we’ve noted.) We’ve yet to receive a reply.
And this week, the blog Panda’s Thumb, which covers creationism and related issues, took aim at the article, which Jason Rosenhouse called:
naive to the point of being silly.
Rosenhouse, a mathematician at James Madison University in Harrisonburg, Va., added:
it’s hard to believe this paper could have gotten through an honest peer-review process (as opposed to one in which ideology played a big role). Whatever happened behind the scenes, it’s a huge black eye for the journal.
Thorvaldsen told Retraction Watch that the journal did not tell him and his co-authors about the disclaimer, but that they heard about it from others:
Regarding the keyword “Intelligent design” associated with the article, I have checked the R2 version of the paper, and the editors are right that we used “Design” as a keyword. This was belatedly updated to “Intelligent design” by us, because “Intelligent design” is discussed in section 6.1 of the paper, including references both positive and negative to “Intelligent design”. The current online version of the article use “Design” as a keyword. This is OK for us.
Our research in biology and bioinformatics is part of our full time positions as professors at our respective Scandinavian universities, where you usually have about 50% of our job for research. We do not have external funding from any other organization for the research published in this paper. This is our professional work funded by our universities. As authors, we have played with open cards, which is also shown by reading the paper and looking at the bibliography. The paper speaks for itself.
We have previously published papers in the Journal of Theoretical Biology and several other biology journals. Of course, it is not beneficial that scientific research is polarized in this way by journals “tagging” its own authors. The Editor’s Disclaimer will be printed in the December issue of the journal, but then the link at the same site as our paper will hopefully be removed: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0022519320302071
Glenn Branch, the deputy director of the National Center for Science Education, in Oakland, Calif., who was familiar with the controversial paper and the fallout, told us:
I can only speculate, but inattention to the details and unfamiliarity with the references might have played a role [in how the article made it into print]. It would be interesting to know whether the editors selected the reviewers based suggestions from the authors or not, of course.
Branch said the article’s inclusion of “token references” to critics of intelligent design may have:
conveyed the impression of even-handedness, although as you see, these tend to occur in contexts like, “Earlier versions of these ideas were criticized, but the current versions are just fine.”
Not surprisingly, the Discovery Institute saw evidence of “cancel culture” in the journal’s decision:
As you know, intelligent design isn’t loved by the establishment media, or elite professors, or social media giants. In fact, we face censorship and discrimination on all fronts in getting our message out. Intelligent design supporters are well acquainted with the “cancel culture,” because we’ve faced it for a long time.
Nevertheless, we are succeeding because the evidence is so compelling — and because readers like you have been willing to go around the censorship by sharing our materials with your family, colleagues, and friends.
That’s one way of looking at things, we guess.
Elsevier, we note, has stumbled in this arena before. In 2011, they apologized to an author for retracting his creationist-friendly paper — and paid his legal fees after he sued them.
Updated 1500 UTC, 10/7/20 with comments from Branch and Thorvaldsen.
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Since the courts have already declared that Intelligent Design is not science, it’s hard to image how the journal can continue to claim to be a peer reviewed journal of science.
Galileo was tried by a court. What special insights do lawyers have?
I wish I could upvote this comment. Fantastic point on the appeal to authority fallacy.
LW might not be correct in general about courts adjudicating science. But in the specific case of Dover it was expert scientific witnesses (not lawyers) who provided the special insights showing that ID is not science.
To follow up on Mike’s reply, lawyers in the Kitzmiller v. Dover case were able to obtain special insights through the magic of the discovery process. The plaintiffs found that a pre-Edwards v. Aguillard draft of “Of Pandas and People” used the term “creationists,” while a post-Edwards draft had replaced all instances of “creationists” with “design proponents.”
With one exception. An erroneous find-and-replace produced the rather strange term “cdesign proponentsists.” As in “c[reation]ists” to “c[design proponents]ists.” That was one of the many smoking guns which made clear that intelligent design was just a rebranding of creationism and therefore, not science.
Normally, not many. But Eric Rothschild studied evolutionary science very hard to prepare, and his cross-examination of Michael Behe in Kitzmiller v Dover was pretty amazing. One reporter used the word “eviscerated”. Starts about 1/4 of the way into http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/dover/day11pm.html if you’re interested. The judges decision was also influenced by the fact that some of the creationists involved lied under oath, and got caught doing it.
Having spent two days reading the transcript of Behe’s cross examination I have to disagree with that reporter’s assessment. Behe put in a solid performance. Rothschild was well-prepare, but ultimately had to wing it with the microbiology, often taking cues from Behe to know when he had gone off the deep end and should drop the line of questioning. Rothschild’s “evisceration” of Behe was a bit of courtroom theater in which he successfully swept aside the question of what evidence the evolutionary biology literature did or did not contain by dramatically demonstrating that that literature is voluminous.
I also found it interesting to read part four of the Dover decision entitled “Is ID Science”. From what I’ve seen this part proved an unintended consolation prize for the Discovery Institute. For example, the excoriation of Behe as a stubborn fool is so sweepingly polemical that, if taken seriously, it would also discredit scores of prominent evolutionary biologists such as the members of the Third Way who, while carefully distancing themselves from Behe, express similar concerns right now on the front page of their website. Worse, Judge Jones explicitly asserts that the evolution/ID debate is not about truth and goes into some detail explaining that the exclusion of ID from science is by arbitrary rule. As you can imagine, ID advocates had an extended and highly fruitful field day with this.
The case gave ID advocates visibility, relevance, and a written guide to upping their game. And one piece of advice they repeatedly received at trial was to
publish in peer-reviewed journals. That is what they are trying to do, so far with only occasional success.
Courts cannot rule on whether something is science. I am not a creationist nor a Christian nor an evolutionist as there are significant Problems with all of them.
The issues raised by Proponents intelligent design are compelling But that doesn’t mean you have to accept any man made religion as valid.
It simply means that we didn’t evolve and whatever designed or created us is unknown.
Hmm, while there could be issues with the paper warranting retraction, it strikes me as a bit odd that it should be retracted solely for associations with ‘untouchables.’
If the mathematics around fine-tuning of molecular machinery are wrong, or the approach flawed, demonstrate it. It is a worrying sign of group think to retract an argument because the author is part of the “wrong group of people.”
“intelligent design” is not science – it is religious belief. why do so-called science journals bow and scrape at the door of religion instead of just retracting such a silly paper? and how on earth did it ever get through peer review – unless they provided their own carefully selected peer reviewers who were also ID believers?
it is beyond time to stop this nonsense and call it for what it is – belief in sky fairies, not science.
is there no end to this silliness?
What exactly is the conflict of interest here? Is there a conflict of interest when a string theorist publishes a string theory paper? Neither string theory nor intelligent design is falsifiable.
What conflict of interest? The paper claims no “competing financial or personal relationships,” and the text of this article states explicitly otherwise.
From the paper:
“Declaration of Competing Interest
The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.”
From this article:
“Meanwhile, Thorvaldsen is the head of an outfit called BioCosmos, which doles out money to people who push intelligent design. Last November, BioCosmos received a $1.6 million grant from Einar Johan Rasmussen, a Norweigian executive partial to the cause, according to this article in Uncommon Descent, a creationist website.
The article states that:
Thorvaldsen is also head of the Norwegian branch of Origo, an evolution-critical magazine and publishing company, a collaboration between Danish and Norwegian evolution sceptics and ID proponents.”
Even if the author receives no compensation for these positions, the positions tend to show possible bias on the part of the author(s) and certainly should’ve been disclosed.
Yes, but who’s pulling the string theorists’ strings???
I know many scientists who have had roles in both some foundations and magazines or journals, but I’ve never seen any of those mentioning their those roles in conflict of interest part of their scientific papers. In fact, I have never seen in any scientific paper mentioned in conflict of interests part of paper that the author is role in some foundation or that he is editor of some magazine, even though many publishing scientists are in those roles in somewhere, and even though I have read thousands of papers, and papers of several languages (not only English papers). It is often told in conflict of interests part of paper, if some of authors have got personal funding outside of university or if your research group has got grants, which is utilized when doing this particular paper, or if some of authors have got salary from organization, which could have conflict of interest in the study area. But bona fide memberships in organizations is not normally mentioned, at least in those scientific papers I’ve read.
I am a Norwegian biologist and teacher and posted this on
https://whyevolutionistrue.com/2020/10/07/jason-rosenhouse-discredits-new-intelligent-design-paper/#comments:
In Retraction Watch Thorvaldsen says in his defense: “Our research in biology and bioinformatics is part of our full time positions as professors at our respective Scandinavian universities, where you usually have about 50% of our job for research. We do not have external funding from any other organization for the research published in this paper. This is our professional work funded by our universities….”
Let’s have a look at his bio in the university where he works:
https://en.uit.no/ansatte/person?p_document_id=66825
If you look at the publication list from the uni you won’t find any bioinformatics or biology. It’s basically all education and education tech stuff. I suspect this case is really embarrassing for the university also now ( This uni is a public well recognized research university). I strongly doubt that this uni has funded , with open eyes, “research” which clearly is just ID nonsense.
I have also contacted the Norwegian University Journal Khronos where there was an article about this paper in july 2020
https://khrono.no/har-fatt-publisert-darwin-kritikk/501038
and I hope they call out Thorvaldsen for a comment on his saying that his ID worked is founded by the university.
I would point out that Thorvaldsen does indeed have several research papers in biology and bioinformatics listed from a decade back, although he is now associated with the teaching department. Most researchers will disagree with his conclusions, but I don’t think it is fair to claim that he has no background in the field.
It is most commendable that the Journal of Theoretical Biology has chosen to publish something that is controversial in the field but scientifically rigorous. While some may not agree with the implications of Intelligent Design, the idea of design and fine-tuning in biology is of utmost importance today. Those who continue to turn a blind eye to these concepts are not current on the discoveries from the fields of systems biology, biophysics, molecular genetics, synthetic biology and biochemistry. Additionally, in a culture that is striving against underrepresentation and supression of voice some of these comments seem quite naive.
The fact that science papers do not point to God, does not mean that the evidence unravelled by science does not point to God. All it means,is that the philosophical framework based on methodological naturalism that surrounds science since its introduction in the 19th century through Thomas Huxley, Darwins bulldog, and the X-club, is a flawed framework, and should have been changed a long time ago, when referencing to historical science, which responds to questions of origins. Arbitrary a priori restrictions are the cause of bad science, where it is not permitted to lead the evidence wherever it is.
Rehashing an old argument for the existence of god… and not even having the good grace to use some fancy new techniques like CRISPR. Who wants to reread The Blind Watchmaker, Aquinas or the Greeks but with math?