Photo credit: Airman 1st Class Alexis Christian, via Peterson Air Force Base.

Editors note: Welcome to anEvolution Newstradition: a countdown of our Top 10 favorite stories of the past year, concluding on New Years Day. Our staff are enjoying the holidays, as we hope that you are, too!Help keep the daily voice of intelligent design going strong. Please give whatever you can to support the Center for Science & Culture before the end of the year!

The following wasoriginallypublished on March 30,2020.

Many people have been wondering about the relevance of intelligent design (ID) or evolution to the new coronavirus reported in Wuhan, China, in December 2019. What follows is my view as a molecular biologist.

The new virus goes by several names. It was initially called2019-nCoVby the World Health Organization (with n standing for new). Since its RNA sequence is similar to that of the coronavirus that causedSevere Acute Respiratory Syndrome(SARS) in 2003, the International Committee on Taxonomy of Viruses renamed itSARS-CoV-2in March 2020. The disease caused by the virus has been calledCOVID-19(with d standing for disease).

There are other coronaviruses (includingMERS-CoV, the virus that caused the 2012 epidemic of Middle East Respiratory Syndrome). To avoid confusion, I will refer to the latest coronavirus by its technical name, SARS-CoV-2.

Some people have maintained that SARS-CoV-2 is a product of human design. According to a FebruaryNew York Postarticle, it may have escaped from a microbiology laboratory at the Wuhan Institute of Virology. But I have seen no scientific evidence to support this claim.

On March 17, 2020, an analysis of RNA from several different coronaviruses was published inNature Medicine. The authors concluded, Our analyses clearly show that SARS-CoV-2 is not a laboratory construct or a purposefully manipulated virus.

Jonathan Bartlett, who has studied the logic ofdesign inferencesin depth, subsequently argued that the scientists had ruled out only one design hypothesis, so design was still theoretically possible. But Bartlett did not maintain that SARS-CoV-2 is a product of human design.

Could SARS-CoV-2 have evolved from another coronavirus by mutation and natural selection? I dont see why not, though there is only indirect evidence (from RNA sequences) to support the idea. If it had happened, however, it would not provide support forDarwinianevolution.

First, viruses are not living organisms: They are just pieces of DNA or RNA enclosed in a protein coat. They do not carry out metabolism (the chemical processes that are essential for life), and they do not reproduce themselves (only living cells or skilled genetic engineers can make copies of them). Second, even if viruses were considered living things, the evolution of SARS-CoV-2 from another coronavirus would be akin to microevolution minor changes within existing biological species. (Species are not even defined the same way in viruses as they are in living organisms.)

But Darwin did not write a book titledHow Existing Species Change Over Time. He wrote a book titledThe Origin of Species. In other words, Darwin attempted to explain macroevolution the origin of new species, organs, and body plans.

What, then, is the relevance of ID or evolution to SARS-CoV-2? As we have seen, their relevance to the origin of the coronavirus is unclear. But what about their relevance to combating the disease, COVID-19? According to DarwinistTheodosius Dobzhansky(who distinguished between microevolution and macroevolution in the 1930s), nothing in biology makes sense except in the light of evolution. In 2003, Texas Tech University professorMichael Diniwrote:

The central, unifying principle of biology is the theory of evolution. How can someone who does not accept the most important theory in biology expect to properly practice in a field [medicine] that is so heavily based on biology?

Yet the measures being taken against the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic owe nothing to evolutionary theory. The use ofquarantineto block the spread of disease began in the fourteenth century. In the 1790s,Edward Jennervaccinated people to protect them from smallpox. In 1847, Hungarian obstetricianIgnc Semmelweisdemonstrated that proper hand washing lowers mortality from infectious disease. Theadministration of oxygento patients with labored breathing was first reported in the years just following the publication ofThe Origin of Species, but the practice was based on physiological and clinical considerations, not evolution. And if any treatments are found to cure COVID-19 or lessen its effects, they will come from the intelligently designed efforts of virologists, biochemists, and clinicians not evolutionary biologists.

Editors note: This article was updated on April 5, 2020.

Excerpt from:

#5 Story of 2020: Coronavirus, Intelligent Design, and Evolution - Discovery Institute