In the final ruling of Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District, Judge Jones specifically singled out Behe and irreducible complexity:

Behe argues that organs and biological features which are irreducibly complex cannot be wholly explained by current models of evolution.

It may be that irreducible complexity does not actually exist in nature, and that the examples given by Behe and others are not in fact irreducibly complex, but can be explained in terms of simpler precursors.

Behe is best known for his argument for irreducible complexity, which asserts that some biochemical structures are too complex to be adequately explained by known evolutionary mechanisms and are therefore more probably the result of intelligent design.

In 2001, Michael Behe wrote: " here is an asymmetry between my current definition of irreducible complexity and the task facing natural selection.

Behe has been accused of using an " argument by lack of imagination ", and Behe himself acknowledges that a failure of current science to explain how an " irreducibly complex " organism did or could evolve does not automatically prove the impossibility of such an evolution.

A second definition given by Behe ( his " evolutionary definition ") is as follows:

In the 2005 Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District trial, Behe gave testimony on the subject of irreducible complexity.

Michael Behe developed his ideas on the concept around 1992, in the early days of the ' wedge movement ', and first presented his ideas about " irreducible complexity " in June 1993 when the " Johnson-Behe cadre of scholars " met at Pajaro Dunes in California.

In the last chapter of Darwin's Black Box, Behe goes on to explain his view that irreducible complexity is evidence for intelligent design.

For example, Kenneth Miller cites the lab work of Barry G. Hall on E. coli, which he asserts is evidence that " Behe is wrong.

Laurence A. Moran writes that by concentrating the attention of the opponent on the stated examples, which are carefully selected to be hard to explain, Behe constructs a Strawman

* "... on cross-examination, Professor Behe was questioned concerning his 1996 claim that science would never find an evolutionary explanation for the immune system.

In 1993, Behe had written a chapter on blood clotting in Of Pandas and People, presenting essentially the same arguments but without the name " irreducible complexity ", which he later presented in very similar terms in a chapter in Darwin's Black Box.

Behe acknowledges acceptance of the Theory of Evolution by " the great majority " of scientists, and states that " most ( though not all ) do so based on authority.

A review on the pro-evolution website talk. origins, described the book as "... an exposition of the Frontiers of Ignorance " and that within it systems were labeled " irreducibly complex " if Behe was not able to envision a simpler system that still worked.

Behe supports the historically incorrect misrepresentation that Darwin's views on the origin of life were atheistic, when On the Origin of Species repeatedly refers to a Creator in a positive and supportive context as impressing laws on matter.

For the 1993 edition, Michael Behe wrote a chapter on blood clotting, presenting arguments which he later presented in very similar terms as " irreducible complexity " in a chapter in his 1996 book Darwin's Black Box.

For example, one of the clotting factors that Behe listed as a part of the clotting cascade was later found to be absent in whales, demonstrating that it is not essential for a clotting system.

Behe next introduces and defines the concept of irreducible complexity as a system with a series of parts in which the removal of any part causes the entire system to cease functioning, offering a springloaded-bar mousetrap as a familiar example.

* The Center for Science and Culture of the Discovery Institute was founded, in part, by Catholic biochemist Michael Behe, who is currently a senior fellow at the Center.

Minnich, Behe, and Paley reach the same conclusion, that complex organisms must have been designed using the same reasoning, except that Professors Behe and Minnich refuse to identify the designer, whereas Paley inferred from the presence of design that it was God.

Behe grew up in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, where he attended grade school at St. Margaret Mary's Parochial School and later graduated from Bishop McDevitt High School .< ref >

Behe identifies one of the primary counter-arguments of irreducible complexity, gradual adaptation — that certain systems may have been co-opted from an original, unrelated role to assume a new function as an irreducibly complex system.

Though Behe has avoided committing himself to the view that God intervenes directly in nature to create purportedly irreducibly complex structures, Darwin's Black Box briefly speculates that divine intervention might have caused the direct creation of a cell from which all of life evolved, supporting creationist views of miraculous acts of creation, but ironically echoing Darwin's stated " view of life, with its several powers, having been originally breathed into a few forms or into one ".

Behe's thesis that irreducible structures are created in " one fell swoop " is opposed by other biochemists, including many who are devout Christians, and has, it is claimed by some, no support from the fossil record-something Behe would dispute.

Biochemistry professor Michael Behe, the originator of the term irreducible complexity, defines an irreducibly complex system as one " composed of several well-matched, interacting parts that contribute to the basic function, wherein the removal of any one of the parts causes the system to effectively cease functioning ".

Potentially viable evolutionary pathways have been proposed for allegedly irreducibly complex systems such as blood clotting, the immune system and the flagellum, which were the three examples Behe used.

While testifying at the Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District trial Behe conceded that there are no peer-reviewed papers supporting his claims that complex molecular systems, like the bacterial flagellum, the blood-clotting cascade, and the immune system, were intelligently designed nor are there any peer-reviewed articles supporting his argument that certain complex molecular structures are " irreducibly complex.

Professor Behe has applied the concept of irreducible complexity to only a few select systems: ( 1 ) the bacterial flagellum ; ( 2 ) the blood-clotting cascade ; and ( 3 ) the immune system.

Intelligent design proponent Michael Behe contends that the system is an example of irreducible complexity and therefore could not have evolved, an argument which is rejected by scientists as logically and factually flawed.

In the following chapters, Behe discusses the apparent irreducible complexity of several biological systems, including the cilium, the bacterial flagellum, blood clotting, the immune system and intracellular gated and vesicular transport.

In the same trial, Behe eventually testified under oath that " There are no peer reviewed articles by anyone advocating for intelligent design supported by pertinent experiments or calculations which provide detailed rigorous accounts of how intelligent design of any biological system occurred ".

Biochemist Michael Behe, another member of " The Wedge ", contributed the argument that he subsequently called " irreducible complexity " ( IC ) to a subsequent edition of Pandas in 1993.

* " Professor Behe admitted in " Reply to My Critics " that there was a defect in his view of irreducible complexity because, while it purports to be a challenge to natural selection, it does not actually address " the task facing natural selection.

Behe has responded to critics of his clotting cascade arguments by suggesting that homology is evidence for evolution, but not for natural selection.

Although Behe acknowledged that the evolution of the larger anatomical features of the eye have been well-explained, he claimed that the complexity of the minute biochemical reactions required at a molecular level for light sensitivity still defies explanation.

Behe suggests that such a paradigm shift in biology ( and particularly in evolution ) is imminent due to recent discoveries ( circa 1996 ) in biochemistry.

Behe states that though he did identify assertions that evolution had occurred, he found none that had been supported by experiment or calculation, and concludes the book by offering intelligent design as a solution to irreducible complexity.

Coyne also accuses Behe of quote mining and using ad hominem attacks against scientists while ' timidly accepting ' evolution.

Mainstream critics, however, argue that irreducible complexity, as defined by Behe, can be generated by known evolutionary mechanisms.

Contrary to Professor Behe ’ s assertions with respect to these few biochemical systems among the myriad existing in nature, however, Dr. Miller presented evidence, based upon peer-reviewed studies, that they are not in fact irreducibly complex.