Logic and the Flagellum

August 23, 2009 by Dr. Mc.

So much is argued back and forth about the flagellum as either designed or evolved. In one particular YouTube video an argument for evolution is answered with an animation of the construction of a flagellum. No narrative accompanies it, but those who posted it apparently consider the animation a “nightmare” for evolutionists.
Before adding my two cents worth, it is important to make clear that there is at least one relevant point about which evolutionists and design theorists agree: No complete or partial organs (or organelles, for that matter) can continually exist for which there is no current advantage, even if a future advantage could be envisaged with additional parts. Both would agree that storage and application of information is costly to any organism, and therefore survival and reproductive advantage goes to the organism that is first to drop the useless information and its subsequent processes. This opinion is most easily justified with blind cave fish and salamanders, and other creatures that have apparently lost sight due to lives in darkness.
In addition design theorists would agree for metaphysical commitments. If there is a designer, the designer would incorporate the part when needed. Why before? Likewise most evolutionists would agree with the statement for metaphysical commitments. For information to be maintained only for future usefulness would imply first cause or purpose-driven evolution. This would erode the whole reason for the current popularity of Darwinian theory—the elimination of the need for purpose, i.e., God.
It is fascinating to watch the assembly video, but I want to call attention to one particular aspect that illustrates the design inference all by itself. Appropriately shaped proteins begin to appear and assemble at the inner surface of the cell wall, but 24 seconds into the video a different sequence begins. Illustrated in white, five proteins rise up through the middle of the forming structure and assemble into a component that punches through the cell’s inner and outer walls as it assembles a column of molecules underneath. Then at 31 seconds it ejects (like an emptied fuel tank in the shuttle launch sequence) and a second assembler comes together to begin the next phase of assembly. That in turn ejects at 45 seconds, after the curved portion of the shaft has been completed, and a third assembler begins to come together at 53 seconds. This third machine is featured with more detail, and you can see how it guides rising parts into place for the assembly of the flagellum whip propeller itself.
What I want to point out is the implication of these three machines as “tools,” necessary for assembly of the flagellum, and not part of the final product. Any one is enough to confound Darwinian theory, based on Darwin’s now-famous formula for how to do it—”If it could be demonstrated that any complex organ existed, which could not possibly have been formed by numerous, successive, slight modifications, my theory would absolutely break down.”
If the flagellum parts could assemble without an assembler, then the assembler coming into existence by chance mutation later would not give reproductive advantage to the organism. If the flagellum parts could not assemble without an assembler, then the flagellum parts would not be retained (having no reproductive advantage) until chance mutation of an assembler later gave them purpose. Both proteins must come into existence at the same time for either to be retained. This is irreducible complexity, and this is what Darwin would agree breaks down his theory.
The Evolution of the Flagellum video that the animation video answers begins with the argument that one must exhaust every corner of biology for possible alternatives before one could say with confidence that irreducible complexity occurs. This is the God-of-the-gaps argument of which Darwinists often accuse Creationists: “If there is anything that cannot be explained by evolution, then God must have done it.” In this case, it is Darwin-of-the-gaps: “If there is anything that Darwinism cannot explain, then some day we will find something that is consistent with Darwinism.” It fails, because we don’t have to wait. It fails by logic. Either one molecule came first, or the other, or they were simultaneous. There are no other options upon which to wait. Charles Darwin did not know about organelles, but his falsification formula indicates that he was an honest scientist. One does not have to wait for the impossible. One must only allow logic its logical end.

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