“The current answer to the question “Is there any hypothetical complex structure in the biological world which can NOT, even in principle, be explained by natural selection?” would be: Not so far.”

Of course, the point is that when evolutionists say to the IDers, “Give us evidence” this is essentially an exercise in rhetoric. They know full well that there is nothing the IDers can show them that would be accepted as evidence under the current evolutionist thinking.

Evidence in all sciences are repeatable observations and testable theories. That is all what biologists are asking creationists for.

And you conflated an open question on hypothetical biological structures with the constrained question on which structures would falsify evolution. Precambrian rabbits, for one, or more generally nested hiearchies that aren’t predicted by common descent mechanisms.

So in the sphere of abiogenesis the relevant question the IDers might ask would be, “What kind of evidence that abiogenesis could NOT have occurred naturally would be acceptable to mainstream science?”

That is a meaningless question as it asks for a universal negative without resorting to theory. A meaningful question can only be based on a theory of ID.

>>>”Of course, the point is that when evolutionists say to the IDers, “Give us evidence” this is essentially an exercise in rhetoric. They know full well that there is nothing the IDers can show them that would be accepted as evidence under the current evolutionist thinking.”

Nice dismissal. I guess the IDer’s are being suppressed then. Or could it be that the IDer’s have nothing left to show, because their previous examples have been shown to be wrong?

>>>”So why don’t they just come out and say that openly instead of making these disingenuous requests for evidence?”

Why doesn’t the DI actually do some science and come up with some then? (shrug)

>>>”Now, if what the evolutionists are really asking for is some new type of evidence which will completely change their minds, then that’s a pretty tall order to fulfill. Short of Yahweh coming done in person and confronting Richard Dawkins and P.Z. Myers at some international conference, I don’t see this ever happening.”

No, me neither. I wonder why?

>>>”Presumably it would have to be some evidence that the known laws of physics or chemistry were violated during the formation of life.”

But since no-one knows for sure how abiogenesis came about, there is no way the IDer’s could ever come up with any evidence anyway. So they resort to God of the gaps, and anti-evolution arguments. Sorry, Tom, but the only rhetoric I see is from your end. There is no such thing as “evolutionist” thinking, since evolution is backed up by a host of other scientific fields. If their IS any evidence to present for ID, by all means present it. Otherwise, all the DI has is hot air. So until they offer anything other than repackaged creationist arguments which have been debunked over and over for decades, or they actually come up with a scientific model of ID, we will wait and wait and wait and wait…

Yes, but that by itself is zero evidence for the existence of an intelligent designer. So in the sphere of abiogenesis the relevant question the IDers might ask would be, “What kind of evidence that abiogenesis could NOT have occurred naturally would be acceptable to mainstream science?” Presumably it would have to be some evidence that the known laws of physics or chemistry were violated during the formation of life.

Of course, the point is that when evolutionists say to the IDers, “Give us evidence” this is essentially an exercise in rhetoric. They know full well that there is nothing the IDers can show them that would be accepted as evidence under the current evolutionist thinking. So why don’t they just come out and say that openly instead of making these disingenuous requests for evidence?

Now, if what the evolutionists are really asking for is some new type of evidence which will completely change their minds, then that’s a pretty tall order to fulfill. Short of Yahweh coming done in person and confronting Richard Dawkins and P.Z. Myers at some international conference, I don’t see this ever happening.

That seems to beg an important question which the ID camp might well ask the evolution camp which is this: Is there any hypothetical complex structure in the biological world which can NOT, even in principle, be explained by natural selection?

Well, presumably evolution all by itself (in the current version) can’t explain abiogenesis, or equivalently, early replication.

1) It is independent of if there were one or several serial or parallel events of abiogenesis. The occurrence of todays DNA world (and perhaps the earlier RNA world) erased any earlier hereditary mechanism by lateral gene transfer (LGT).

2) It is independent of the nature of abiogenesis by the same token. A RNA replicator can be naturally produced or poofed, yet evolution will proceed from there.

3) The current version of MET doesn’t cover all types of hereditary mechanisms.

Evolution can be minimally defined as:

Evolution is a process that results in heritable changes in a population spread over many generations.

Presumably in abiogenesis the hereditary elements are distributed over the system as such. This changes, perhaps invalidates, parts of evolution theory such as population genetics. Another problem is that early replicators are expected to be not faithful. Under the so called “darwinian threshold” there isn’t any lineages as we are used to, even in LGT where lateral elements retain individual lineages.

OTOH MET can handle some types of distributive and not faithful systems. The concept of quasispecies are thought to apply to early replicators, and ER viruses such as HIV are so rapidly evolving that this model have been used AFAIU – the HIV genome is not an identifiable point in “fitness space” but a rapidly moving cloud of points.

And MET will of course add on additional mechanisms and systems that abiogenesis research uncover.

But again, as evolution as fact and theory is independent of abiogenesis, why would creationists bother with attacking evolution? [Hint: They don't like the fact that humans evolve.]

But there is never a 100% answer in science. There is always the possibility of new evidence being discovered later that may require current scientific theories to be reworked, or maybe even thrown out the window. So you could never get a direct YES or NO answer. The current answer to the question “Is there any hypothetical complex structure in the biological world which can NOT, even in principle, be explained by natural selection?” would be: Not so far.

This is why it would be valid for “evolutionists” (whatever they are) to ask the IDer’s to look for such a structure. Problem is, they aren’t actively looking and the current examples the DI have given are false. Plus, evidence against evolution is not evidence for ID. So until then, we will wait, and wait, and wait, and wait…