The Proceedings of the Eighth International Conference on Creationism (2018)

are viewed from a design perspective as highly influential variables utilized in the offspring’s assorted developmental algorithms, but they do not control the entire development. External conditions do not bypass an organism’s boundary and directly control the expression of its genes, but expression is a system-derived outcome with no single system element elevated to causal status. Embryonic control systems, sensors, and developmental response mechanisms map the course of development by constantly monitoring and self-adjusting to internal and external states. Recall how tadpoles of the tree frog Hyla chrysoscelis will rapidly morph into a form with thick muscular bright red tails when they “detect waterborne chemical” substances “produced by predators” of the dragonfly larvae in the water (McCollum and Leimberger 1997, p. 616). The detection of dragonfly larvae chemical signatures is only data. That data is a reliable conditional input to their developmental program that directs them to develop tails to better escape predation. Sensors specifically tuned for dragonfly larvae are the actual “triggers” within organisms to initiate their self-adjustment processes. E. Environmental tracking requires the whole organism The tracking elements of sensors, logic mechanisms, and response systems may reside very distantly from each other on the organism but nonetheless work very tightly together. Possessing a sensor is not enough. Programming internal to the organism specifies what constitute actual environmental “signals” or “stimuli” for itself (which explains why a myriad of other exposures are never stimuli for the sensor). This implies that adaptations result from the functioning of the whole organism, and not merely from genomic changes. Likewise, the research of Shapiro (2016) demonstrates that in one of it several roles, the genome looks like a dynamic logic-housing sub-system of the cell (or organism) supporting its role of responding to detected conditions. Thus, environmental tracking ability appears to be irreducible below the organismal level. F. Targeted, rapid solutions solve environmental challenges As organisms track environmental targets, their responses are directed toward solutions specifically targeted to the challenge. Astyanax mexicanas , progeny’s reduced eye size in cave conditions is a single-step, focused response. Mus muluscus pups’ increased glomeruli and neuronal support was specifically targeted for acetophenone. Crucian carp, Carassius carassius , responded precisely to gape-limited predators by rapidly morphing into a larger size. Cavia aperea guinea pig pups had epigenetic changes on genes specific for temperature regulation, and so forth. Targeted responses indicate mechanisms operating in a vastly different manner from those which would produce the random results expected in the dominant framework where “further improvements were accidentally thrown up (by genetic mutation, according to modern biology) then retained in turn” (Millikan 2014, p. 63) or the hit-and-miss results that Peter Godfrey-Smith states are expected from a selectionist framework that must “…rely on a process that can be described loosely as ‘trial and error’. New variations are produced in a spontaneous and unintelligent way, and a few successful variants are kept while others are discarded” (Godfrey-Smith 2010, p.29). G. Epigenetic mechanisms facilitate rapid phenotypic “flexing” Phenotypic flexing captures two concepts related to engineered robustness: the ability to rapidly “bend” phenotypically, but not break, to stressful conditions; and the ability to return to “baseline” if conditions revert. Accumulation of mutations within the germ line, or even variation from a standing population of heterozygous alleles, seems far too slow to solve some challenges. Internally- regulated epigeneticmechanisms variablymark specific nucleotides of DNA with different molecules which exert control over how the information in DNA is expressed, but without changing the genetic sequence. From a design-based view, genetic stability combined with plastic variable expression confers the ability for phenotypes to rapidly “flex” to a rapid environmental change. CET would imply epigenetic changes such as rapid (within one generation) adaptations that of necessity fill an intermediate time gap between very rapid physiologic changes and slow, multi-generational genetic changes. Weyrich et al. (2016) sum up this function: “The regulation of genes and their expression is fundamental for immediate adaptation processes in the same generation. In addition, the inheritance of responses to experienced changes (adapted traits) is fundamental for long-term adaptational memory. The mechanism regulating gene expression and conferring such immediate and inherited adaptation is ‘epigenetic response’” (p.1). H. Diversification as a continuum of adaptations succeeding continuous tracking With CET, environmental tracking should happen continuously from development through the time offspring inherit niche-suitable resemblances. Therefore, adaptive phenotypes produced by epigenetic mechanisms or phenotypic plasticity could be viewed as a continuum of change which would range from rapid physiologic to multi-generational. Speciation may not be a “goal,” “target,” or “end-product” as researchers generally understand it, but it could be thought of as simply a transient manifestation of a discreet set of characters along a continuum of adaptation. I. CET of variable conditions correlates with observed episodic speciation rates The CET hypothesis implies that organisms track environmental changes at whatever rate and manner that they occur. This contrasts with a fundamental tenet of the current framework: gradualism. Gradualism holds that the rate of diversification, (as seen by the magnitude of morphologic change within a taxon,) must be essentially linear in terms of the number of species over time. Stephen J. Gould explains why this belief may not consistently align with actual observations but is a core principle of selectionist theory nonetheless: “substantial change might occur as a very rare event, but most alteration must be insensible, even on geologic scales.” (Gould 2002, p. 147, emphasis in original). CET is free from a constraint on how rates will be interpreted. Therefore, it would be expected that at times the rate of change could be described as linear, episodic, or asymptotic, and the trajectory may be either positive or negative. Jeanson (2015) completed a unique in-depth study of mtDNA, amassing data he used to graph the cumulative total number of species for representative kinds of organisms versus time, covering Guliuzza and Gaskill ◀ How organisms continuously track environmental changes ▶ 2018 ICC 168