Advancement by Objection

February 20, 2008 by Dr. Mc.

This first paragraph is rather technical, so some readers
may wish to skip to the second. I waded into some deep water with my last post,
and need to sort out the technical responses. The responses, mostly to my
chagrin, were well-stated and deserve a reply. I promised to check out the
objections, and found the following: Cells have indeed been found
without mitochondria, the energy-producing organelles that power most of
what happens in cells as we know them. These are amitochondrial (meaning
"without mitochondria") parasites that generate their ATP (energy packs) from an
organelle called a hydrogenosome. Not that Wikipedia is the ultimate authority,
but I read there that hydrogenosomes are suspected of evolving from mitochondia.
This is also suggested by the observations of
Peyretaillade et. al, who conclude that the prokaryote-like features within
these organisms "may be derived rather than primitive characters." If that is
the only case, then organisms that do not possess mitochondria cannot be boasted to
represent cells before mitochondria. My core point remains, i.e., the idea that
there once was an ancestor of all cells that had no mitochondria lacks support.
The strongest "evidence" seems to me to be that cells with mitochondria exist,
and if we assume that Darwinian evolution is true, then all life came from
simpler life, and the simplest life must have come by chance from non-life,
therefore there must have been an organism before with no mitochondria, and if
it generated some energy pack simpler than ATP, it is yet to be even
theoretically explained. Again I confess, I am in over my head, but if this
logic is not correct, someone please set me straight.

But speaking of setting me straight, another blogger
pointed out that oxygen-processing is not required by all cells. I’m nailed on
that one, and I have even written about such organisms in previous posts myself!
I should have stuck with the energy issue, and my point would not have gotten
lost with my credibility.

Most of my credibility was lost on the particular article I
chose as my Exhibit A. There apparently was quite a bit more wrong with the
article than the creationist position. I would ask readers to note, however,
that the Chronicle article and the article objecting to the Proteomic
submission did as I suggested camp on the creation or anti-evolution issue to
the neglect of the deeper, and I would say more serious problems of plagiarism
and breaches of grammar and logic. The seriousness of the other issues makes the
point even stronger that they should not have been upstaged by objections to
Darwinism.

I will leave my February 8 entry as is, because a) I have
begun it with a caveat about my short-falls, but more importantly because b) it
and the responses to it illustrate what this blog is all about, namely academic
freedom. This is what is supposed to happen: When statements are made in the
name of science, we should applaud the raising of objections to unsubstantiated
remarks. Therein lies the only possibility to advance science.

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