Again Netdynam - concerning Creationists and Darwin

[KXX4493553 at aol.com]

You've heard me rant about the current row regarding conservative  school
boards wanting to teach creationism in the schools.  Along with  the
creationists are some smarter or sneakier folks who  champion
"Intelligent Design."  I.D. says essentially that there must  have been
an intelligence behind the complexities of life.

Here's a  blurb out of Netsurfer Digest that is surely going to be part
of the  debate.  I seriously doubt it will sway the true-believers  though
because their belief is just that.

Testing  Darwin

There's bad news for creationists and intelligent design  proponents
coming out of the labs these days. Quietly, over the years, a  research
team at Michigan State University's Digital Evolution  Laboratory
(Devolab) has been developing an increasingly  sophisticated
demonstration of evolution and finding deep insight into just  how it
works. The organisms the team uses aren't organic, but computer  code
that can mutate and respond to changes in the environment. The  computer
program that runs this, Avida, is a test bed of life, one that can  crank
through generations fast enough for practical study, with each  step
available for examination. All the hallmarks of life's grand  adventure,
from simple chemicals to complex organisms, can be examined in  minute
detail. Perhaps most importantly, the Avida results confirm  that
complexity can develop step by step from simplicity, and that  evolution
often provides different and often unexpected adaptations with  no
predetermined channel or direction. Avida itself is freely available  on
the Internet and many collaborators are using it to set up their  own
experiments into the laws of life. Carl Zimmer's Discover cover story  on
the Avida experiments provides fascinating details about  Devolab's
ingenious project.
Zimmer:  http://www.carlzimmer.com/articles/2005/articles_2005_Avida.html
Devolab:  http://devolab.cse.msu.edu/
Avida: _http://devolab.cse.msu.edu/software/avida/_ 
(http://devolab.cse.msu.edu/software/avida/) 
--------------------

kwp

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