'Tis But a Scratch!

Sean Carroll, the estimable author of Endless Forms Most Beautiful and The Making of the Fittest, dismantles Michael Behe's creationist apology The Edge of Evolution in a book review at Science. While taking down Behe is so simple even a research assistant could do it (heh heh just joking ERV:), Carroll does get a hat tip for his Best Use of a Monty Python Metaphor in describing Intelligent Design advocates insistence on showing up at a sword fight armed with sticks. Unfortunately for ID, Behe is about as sharp as a bowl of jello.

"The continuing futile attacks by evolution's opponents reminds me of another legendary confrontation, that between Arthur and the Black Knight in the movie Monty Python and the Holy Grail. The Black Knight, like evolution's challengers, continues to fight even as each of his limbs is hacked off, one by one. The 'no transitional fossils' argument and the 'designed genes' model have been cut clean off, the courts have debunked the "ID is science" claim, and the nonsense here about the edge of evolution is quickly sliced to pieces by well-established biochemistry. The knights of ID may profess these blows are 'but a scratch' or 'just a flesh wound,' but the argument for design has no scientific leg to stand on."

Cartoon Credit: Joe Sutliff, after Monty Python and the Holy Grail