Different Standards of Evidence

In a post some time ago titled The Dog DID my Homework I commented on the odd inequity of intelligent design advocates asking for detailed evolutionary histories of each structure, while expecting no more than raw assertions of themselves.

Carl Zimmer on The Loom has written a National Geographic article on the evolution of complex structures (I haven’t read it yet, but will get there soon). Casey Luskin responded (?) to the article, and Zimmer has in turn responded to him.

Zimmer comments:

It’s remarkable that he calls for an absurdly detailed reconstruction of history as evidence for evolution, while expecting nothing of the sort from advocates of intelligent design. Apparently the rules are different at the Discovery Institute. There you need only make vague references to a designer, claim some supposed shortfalls of evolution, and you’re done.

I think this issue of the level of original research required of each side is the most telling point in the ID debate. ID advocates need to get down to doing and publishing original scientific research. Unfortunately, I don’t see any promising lines of such research, and apparently neither do the qualified scientists who should see them if there are some available.