Real science or just pop culture?
Huntington, Ind. "Dr. Jonathan Wells, Senior Fellow of the Discovery Institute, a think tank for discussing current scientific and cultural issues, will present Icons of Evolution: Why Much Of What We Teach About Evolution Is Wrong. The presentation is part of the college's Forester Lecture Series and will be held in the main auditorium of the Merillat Centre for the Arts on Thursday, March 15, at 7:00 pm. The public is cordially invited to attend.
Jonathan Wells has received two Ph.D.s, one in Molecular and Cell Biology from the University of California at Berkeley, and one in Religious Studies from Yale University. He has done postdoctoral research at the University of California at Berkeley, and has taught biology at California State University in Hayward.
Dr. Wells has published articles in both scientific and religious journals. He is also author of the book Charles Hodge's Critique of Darwinism (Edwin Mellen Press, 1988). He has recently published Icons of Evolution, a critical assessment of the most commonly cited evidence for unguided evolution to explain the origin and diversity of life. Dr. Wells' work in developmental biology poses a serious challenge to the neo-Darwinian idea that random mutations can create new body plans and organisms.
Some of the questions raised in the controversial new book, Icons of Evolution, include:
- Why do textbooks claim that the 1953 Miller-Urey experiment shows how life's building blocks may have formed on the early Earth, when conditions on the early Earth were probably nothing like those used in the experiment, and the origin of life remains a mystery?
- Why do textbooks use drawings of similarities in vertebrate embryos as evidence for their common ancestry, even though biologists have known for over a century that vertebrate embryos are not most similar in their early stages, and the drawings are faked?
- Why do textbooks use pictures of peppered moths camouflaged on tree trunks as evidence for natural selection, when biologists have known since the 1980s that these moths don't normally rest on tree trunks, and all the pictures have been staged?
Dr. Wells has put forth some very credible evidence to support the idea that much of what is usually provided as evidence for Darwinian evolution is just not adequate. He is a well-credentialed developmental biologist with a very important message for those with an open mind, suggests Dr. Bruce Evans, associate professor of biology at Huntington College.
The Forester Lecture Series is presented annually at Huntington College. The free, public lectures are designed to bring interesting persons and topics to the attention of students and the regional community. For further information, contact Dr. Chris Leland, program coordinator, at 260-359-4278.
