Biological complexity

I never thought it would happen but, in my estimation, Richard Lenski has acquired a challenger for the title of “Best Experimental Evolutionary Scientist.” Lenski, of course, is the well-known fellow who has been growing E. coli in his lab at Michigan State for 50,000 generations in order to follow its evolutionary progress. His rival is Joseph Thornton of the University of Oregon who, by inferring the sequences of ancient proteins and then constructing (he calls it “resurrecting”) their genes in his lab, is able to characterize the properties of the ancestral proteins and discern how they may have evolved into more modern versions with different properties. I have written appreciatively about both Lenski and Thornton before, whose work indicates Read More ›

Dear Readers, University of Chicago evolutionary biologist Jerry Coyne has responded at TalkReason.org to my reply here on Amazon.com to his review of The Edge of Evolution in The New Republic. Here I will respond back — not to everything he wrote (nor to other posts and replies on that website), but only to what I think are the more important points of his original response. Because it quickly gets awkward to include all of the context, I will just quote the portions of his response that I specifically address here. Readers who want to see the full back-and-forth should read his posted review and response. Coyne: It is clear from Behe’s response on his Amazon blog to the negative reviews by Sean Carroll and Read More ›