Even when they claim to be super-smart?
David Scott Springer, aka 'Davescot', a retired Dell computer programmer, has apparently convinced himself that because of his super-high IQ (he claims to have a 'certified' IQ "north of 150") and the facts that he has a couple of patents and, afterall, worked with computers, anything he thinks about non-computer things like, oh say, evolution, must be absolutely correct (for kicks, see this).
In reality, Springer, like all such folk, simply does not understand how little he actually understands about subjects that he has no training, education, or experience in. His claim that one can learn biology in their spare time notwithstanding, The FallibleFiend, who happens to be an engineer (see? they're not all bad... :) ), points out a major misinterpretation by Springer in a post he had written earlier in which he had claimed that a study showed that conserved gene elements in humans were most similar to the coelacanth.
That is not what the paper indicates, and Fiend points this out. He tried to point it out to Springer, also, but wouldn't you know it:
"My post never showed up - and there was never a retraction."
If you do not know, Springer's haunt is Bill "Ted Haggard of Information Theory" Dembski's blog, Uncommon Descent, a haven for creationist sycophants to drool at the feet of their hero Dembski and idiotic mumbo jumbo masquerading as 'deep thoughts' to be posted. It is also one of the most heavily "moderated" (censored) blogs on the topic, second only to those blogs on which the authors do not allow comments at all.
****
UPDATE
Apparently, the post has finally been allowed at UD. I have to wonder if it was because so many people pointed out the censorship angle that Springer flet compelled to put it up. No matter, Fallible says the reply Springer spewed was basically irrelevant. Like most things Springer writes.
Friday, December 29, 2006
Thursday, December 21, 2006
Bill "Ted Haggard of Information Theory" Dembski is truly delusional
I can't think of any other way to describe it.
There is a long history of his antics which could be described as being, at the very least, unwarranted, but within the last few weeks, he has really blown his top.
Now it turns out that he had written an email to Rishard Dawkins a few years ago, gloating about his implicit connections to power and well.... let's just see how things turned out for Billy:
thanks to Panda's Thumb
Well, let's see....
Senator Rick Santorum - the number 3 republican in Congress - lost his re-election bid
in fact, republicans, who are much more likely to be gullible and uninformed enough to buy into Intelligent Design, lost both houses of Congress
G.W. Bush has the lowest approval rating of his presidency
Dembski is no longer at Baylor
Faculty and Staff have written a letter protesting the consideration of having the Bush library there
Dembski is now a religion teacher at a small Baptist Seminary. He writes on a couple of heavily-censored blogs. He engages in sophomoric antics and has produced no new research in years.*
He relies on rhetoric and public relations ploys rather than producing anything viable that mioght convince skeptics of the validity of his claims.**
He continues to claim that 'Darwinism' will be dead in a few years and keeps writing how he is proud to have been a part of it. He resorts to denigrating the judge in the Dover case - a case that he was too intellectually cowardly to participate in - for finding the truth - that ID is religion.
He claims that his fart-noise flash animation has had an impact on 'young people' who will now not trust Judge Jones...
Like I said. Delusional.
And he is the most prolific, most "respected" leader of the Intelligent Design Creationism movement.
*I am being generous and considering, for the sake of argument, that his oft-refuted earlier gibberish had at least some legitimate research componant to it
** Just being generous, again.
There is a long history of his antics which could be described as being, at the very least, unwarranted, but within the last few weeks, he has really blown his top.
Now it turns out that he had written an email to Rishard Dawkins a few years ago, gloating about his implicit connections to power and well.... let's just see how things turned out for Billy:
X-Sender: [Dembski’s email at discovery.org] (Unverified) Date: Wed, 26 Nov
2003 21:11:27 -0600 To: Richard Dawkins [email]From: “William A. Dembski”
[email] Subject: President Bush Cc: “Eugenie C. Scott” [email], [Daniel Dennett
email], [Paul Gross email], [Barbara Forrest email]
Dear Prof. Dawkins,
I enjoyed this bit of fun in last week’s Guardian. It might interest you to know that Senator Rick Santorum, who is close to President Bush, endorsed my forthcoming book The Design Revolution. It might also interest you to know that President Bush lives in the same Texas county that I do (McLennan County – his home is about 35 miles from my home). It might futher interest you to know that my university, Baylor, today made a bid on the George W. Bush Presidential Library (for the news conference, go to www.baylortv.com).
Why might all this interest you? With the recommendations by Senator Santorum and others close to President Bush, I plan to pay him a visit at his home early next year and have a frank discussion with him about the future of science in the United States and the possibilities for public funding of intelligent design research. I expect
your remarks below will help me make my case.
Thanks for all you continue to do to advance the work of intelligent design. You are an instrument in the hands of Providence however much you rail against it.
With all good wishes,Bill Dembski
thanks to Panda's Thumb
Well, let's see....
Senator Rick Santorum - the number 3 republican in Congress - lost his re-election bid
in fact, republicans, who are much more likely to be gullible and uninformed enough to buy into Intelligent Design, lost both houses of Congress
G.W. Bush has the lowest approval rating of his presidency
Dembski is no longer at Baylor
Faculty and Staff have written a letter protesting the consideration of having the Bush library there
Dembski is now a religion teacher at a small Baptist Seminary. He writes on a couple of heavily-censored blogs. He engages in sophomoric antics and has produced no new research in years.*
He relies on rhetoric and public relations ploys rather than producing anything viable that mioght convince skeptics of the validity of his claims.**
He continues to claim that 'Darwinism' will be dead in a few years and keeps writing how he is proud to have been a part of it. He resorts to denigrating the judge in the Dover case - a case that he was too intellectually cowardly to participate in - for finding the truth - that ID is religion.
He claims that his fart-noise flash animation has had an impact on 'young people' who will now not trust Judge Jones...
Like I said. Delusional.
And he is the most prolific, most "respected" leader of the Intelligent Design Creationism movement.
*I am being generous and considering, for the sake of argument, that his oft-refuted earlier gibberish had at least some legitimate research componant to it
** Just being generous, again.
Saturday, December 09, 2006
Climate change deniers - stupid or just dishonest?
Well, we all know the answer to that question when it comes to Oklahoma Republican James "Global Warming is a hoax and I have no gay relatives" Inhofe - both.
But what about these guys?
Read this little snippet from their paper and see if you can spot the illogic:
If you are not well versed in the sciences, a few pointers:
Anthropogenic means "man made." Humans have been producing measurable amounts of CO2 since the dawn of the Industrial Revolution, so for about 200 years or so.
Geologic history refers to the entire length of time that the earth has been a planet, more or less. That amount of time is some 4.6 BILLION years.
The authors take the amount of CO2 degassed by the planet over the course of 4.6 billion years and directly compare it to the amount of CO2 produced by humans in the last couple hundred years and conclude that the amount humans produce is no big deal.
That is sort of like taking the record-breaking number of yards that Corey Dillon rushed in a single game (278) and claiming that it is no big deal when one compares it to all the yards rushed by all football players in all games since football was first played.
The rest of Khilyuk and Chilingar's paper is no less bad. A devastating response was written by W. Aeschbach-Hertig a few months later. His response ends with:
Indeed. Why the journal decided to publish such anti-global warming garbage is anybody's guess - to avoid a perceived bias? to give the naysayers 'equal time'? to avoid a ruckus over denying the paper?
Who knows. But what is certain is that it would appear that the best the climate change naysayers have to offer is biased dreck and truly junk science, as indicated by the legitimate science presented in the rebuttal.
But poor Jimmy Inhofe can't tell the difference.
*Thanks to Deltoid for writing about this fiasco in the first place.
But what about these guys?
Read this little snippet from their paper and see if you can spot the illogic:
Recalculating this amount into the total anthropogenic carbon dioxide emission in grams of CO2, one obtains the estimate 1.003×10^18 g, which constitutes less than 0.00022% of the total CO2 amount naturally degassed from the mantle during geologic history. Comparing these figures, one can conclude that anthropogenic carbon dioxide emission is negligible (indistinguishable) in any energy-matter transformation processes changing the Earth’s climate.
If you are not well versed in the sciences, a few pointers:
Anthropogenic means "man made." Humans have been producing measurable amounts of CO2 since the dawn of the Industrial Revolution, so for about 200 years or so.
Geologic history refers to the entire length of time that the earth has been a planet, more or less. That amount of time is some 4.6 BILLION years.
The authors take the amount of CO2 degassed by the planet over the course of 4.6 billion years and directly compare it to the amount of CO2 produced by humans in the last couple hundred years and conclude that the amount humans produce is no big deal.
That is sort of like taking the record-breaking number of yards that Corey Dillon rushed in a single game (278) and claiming that it is no big deal when one compares it to all the yards rushed by all football players in all games since football was first played.
The rest of Khilyuk and Chilingar's paper is no less bad. A devastating response was written by W. Aeschbach-Hertig a few months later. His response ends with:
It is astonishing that the paper of Khilyuk and Chilingar (2006) (as well as Khilyuk and Chilingar 2004, for that matter) could pass the review process of a seemingly serious journal such as Environmental Geology. Such failures of this process, which is supposed to guarantee the quality of published literature, are likely to damage the
reputation of this journal.
Indeed. Why the journal decided to publish such anti-global warming garbage is anybody's guess - to avoid a perceived bias? to give the naysayers 'equal time'? to avoid a ruckus over denying the paper?
Who knows. But what is certain is that it would appear that the best the climate change naysayers have to offer is biased dreck and truly junk science, as indicated by the legitimate science presented in the rebuttal.
But poor Jimmy Inhofe can't tell the difference.
*Thanks to Deltoid for writing about this fiasco in the first place.
Thursday, December 07, 2006
Poor, confused Looney
This guy is in over his head - WAYYYYY over his head - and he does not seem to realize it at all (that creationist/engineer arrogance at work).
Take this post of his for instance. The title says much:
"Why Darwinism remains hopelessly bound to Spontaneous Generation"
His 'answer' is the Miller-Urey experiments. He declares that because there is a question about it on the SAT II test, that this shows that it is "thus considered vital knowledge by the Darwinian community."
First, he never says what the "Darwinist community" is. But it appears to be his paranoid fantasy that some cabal of "Darwinists" is in charge of writing the SAT II exams and felt that the Miller-Urey experiments on the origin of life - which Looney foolishly refers to as 'spontaneous generation' - are of paramount importance in accepting 'Darwinism.'
Looney, like most creationists with limited knowledge of the relevant science, goes on to distort what the experiments were set up to do. Which is odd, since he provides a link to a Wikipedia article on the experiments. He claims, for example, that "Also, proteins formed from amino acids aren't sufficient to form life by themselves either. They need something more, like DNA and RNA." Which is all well and good, but, again, this has nothing to do with the Miller-Urey experiemtns, as the link Looney provides indicates:
But Looney the creationist cannot be bothered with details.
He also comments on my introducing him to the Salem hypothesis and what I call the Kruger-Dunning effect. Both of which he misinterprets, by the way.
Of the Salem hypothesis, Looney writes:
Again we see 'Darwinist', but we are never told what this is. Looney claims that he sees engineering as applied science and design, which I do, too. Applied science is not science per se. It is taking the hard lab/experimental work of scientists, boiling it down to its most useful form, and using it as a jumping-off point of sorts (and don't forget to mix in a bunch of trial and error).
And yet again we see that all-too-common conflation of human actiity (intelligent design) with Intelligent Design Creationism, as in 'the bacterial flagellum is so complex, it must have come form an Intelligent Designer.' I have asked Looney to clarify this illogical, simplistic analogy/conflation, and he has thus far refused to even reply.
Looney then distorts the Kruger-Dunning effect:
Not quite - it states that people with limited understanding of a particular subject lack the ability to know how poorly they understand that subject. It says nothing about intelligence. In fact, the term "intelligence" does not once appear in the article.
Looney may well be intelligent, but he is clearly pretty ignornat of science in general and especially the biological sciences. Problem is, he also happens to be a creationist with an engineering background, and thus believes himself able to comment authoritativley on the subjects. Problem is, he clearly does not understand as much about them as he thinks he does. He is a prime example of the Kruger-Dunning effect, another aspect of which is the inability of the overconfident to understand how little they understand of the subjects they know little about.
Take this post of his for instance. The title says much:
"Why Darwinism remains hopelessly bound to Spontaneous Generation"
His 'answer' is the Miller-Urey experiments. He declares that because there is a question about it on the SAT II test, that this shows that it is "thus considered vital knowledge by the Darwinian community."
First, he never says what the "Darwinist community" is. But it appears to be his paranoid fantasy that some cabal of "Darwinists" is in charge of writing the SAT II exams and felt that the Miller-Urey experiments on the origin of life - which Looney foolishly refers to as 'spontaneous generation' - are of paramount importance in accepting 'Darwinism.'
Looney, like most creationists with limited knowledge of the relevant science, goes on to distort what the experiments were set up to do. Which is odd, since he provides a link to a Wikipedia article on the experiments. He claims, for example, that "Also, proteins formed from amino acids aren't sufficient to form life by themselves either. They need something more, like DNA and RNA." Which is all well and good, but, again, this has nothing to do with the Miller-Urey experiemtns, as the link Looney provides indicates:
The molecules produced were simple organic molecules, far from a complete living biochemical system, but the experiment established that the hypothetical processes could produce some building blocks of life without requiring life to synthesize them first.
But Looney the creationist cannot be bothered with details.
He also comments on my introducing him to the Salem hypothesis and what I call the Kruger-Dunning effect. Both of which he misinterprets, by the way.
Of the Salem hypothesis, Looney writes:
The Darwinist will most likely attribute this to a deficiency in science. As the engineer views his discipline more as Applied Science + Design, we tend to take a dim view of this attitude. The other possibility is that engineers are more likely to have a proper respect for Design than scientists and prefer a unified world view with design near the center. The Darwinist must necessarily have a split world view where Intelligent Design is mandatory in high-tech, but impossible in biology. It is a bit schizophrenic.
Again we see 'Darwinist', but we are never told what this is. Looney claims that he sees engineering as applied science and design, which I do, too. Applied science is not science per se. It is taking the hard lab/experimental work of scientists, boiling it down to its most useful form, and using it as a jumping-off point of sorts (and don't forget to mix in a bunch of trial and error).
And yet again we see that all-too-common conflation of human actiity (intelligent design) with Intelligent Design Creationism, as in 'the bacterial flagellum is so complex, it must have come form an Intelligent Designer.' I have asked Looney to clarify this illogical, simplistic analogy/conflation, and he has thus far refused to even reply.
Looney then distorts the Kruger-Dunning effect:
This states that people of lower intelligence have a habit of making ignorant statements about the big things. If I recall correctly, Darwin didn't do too well in school ...
Not quite - it states that people with limited understanding of a particular subject lack the ability to know how poorly they understand that subject. It says nothing about intelligence. In fact, the term "intelligence" does not once appear in the article.
Looney may well be intelligent, but he is clearly pretty ignornat of science in general and especially the biological sciences. Problem is, he also happens to be a creationist with an engineering background, and thus believes himself able to comment authoritativley on the subjects. Problem is, he clearly does not understand as much about them as he thinks he does. He is a prime example of the Kruger-Dunning effect, another aspect of which is the inability of the overconfident to understand how little they understand of the subjects they know little about.
Wow - 'Looney' goes off the deep end...
I've been enjoying watching Looney flail and squirm and avoid addressing issues both here and at his own blog. But this - this is just too rich...
Emphasis mine. Wow....
Looney has made a couple more posts at his blog which are unintentionally hilarious, and I will deal with them in short order.
Smokey, much of the problem here is that Darwinists have projected the supernatural, intelligent design capabilities of God onto inanimate genetics.
Thus, you must attribute supernatural powers to genetics (while denying such), which I don't.This is why we have a problem with young engineers thinking that they will be able to do amazing things with GA. They are superstitious, unlike us more practical and worldly fundamentalists.
Emphasis mine. Wow....
Looney has made a couple more posts at his blog which are unintentionally hilarious, and I will deal with them in short order.
Wednesday, December 06, 2006
classic comeback
Over on Loony's blog, Loony is busily engaging in the old anti-intellectualism we see so often form creationists. He makes a quip designed to deflate the scientific consensus on evolution, but Smokey makes a zinger of a comeback:
Loony:
"Groups of smart people routinely make incredibly dumb decisions."
Smokey:
But not as routinely as groups of dumb people do.
Glorious!
Loony:
"Groups of smart people routinely make incredibly dumb decisions."
Smokey:
But not as routinely as groups of dumb people do.
Glorious!
Tuesday, December 05, 2006
'Looney' - another creationist engineer with all the answers
I recently was amused to see this comment:
here.
Which was odd, for it had no real bearing at all on the post being replied to.
Note a couple things:
- A 'dig' about the amount of money paid in each profession
- the requisite conflation of 'intelligent design' done by humans with the 'Intelligent Design' of the IDcreationism movement
- A 'dig' about how 'scientists' are not trained in ID and so 'look down on it'
Generally silly stuff, so I decided to check out the author.
It is one "Looney", a fundamentalist Christian engineer (what else!). I checked out his blog, and lo and behold - he has a post about how molecular biology has nothing to do with "Darwinism" .
He 'knows' this because he picked up a 13 year old textbook on genetics and molecular biology that did not mention Darwinism once. Wow! Clever stuff! Surely, only an engineer could make such an insightful conclusion! Wait - there is more...
Yeah, because us biologists is just so stupid. Why, we don't understand no kem-er-sty. I mean, we don't have any chemistry in our curricula. No physics, either. And math? Never heard of it. But engineers, why, they have all that stuff, not to mention the copious amounts of biology* they are required to study...
(* note - this is graduate level, and only for biomedical engineering)
And it goes on...
Of course. Just BS. Something made-up by propagandists. And of course the use of EASY TO UNDERSTAND 'intelligent design' analogies and metaphors to help explain those simple biology concepts. Seems to me that if biological concepts were so simplistic, we would be using biology analogies to help explain engineering concepts.
Doesn't work that way, though.
Buit wait - the intellectual coup de grace:
Wondderful! Yeah - biologists don't understand.... molecular biology.
Creationists can be humiliated, silenced, and put in their place all on their own - their intellectual dishonesty, their ignorance-based pseudocertainty, their willful ignorance, their outright fabrications and distortions - no, they do not need any help from us. That another creationist engineer doesn't understand a technical subdiscipline of the field of biology is no surprise. What is a surprise is that here is yet another creationist with an engineering background that exhibits nicely what I call the Kruger-Dunning effect (also, 'Loony' is yet another data point for the Salem hypothesis).
No wait - that is not a surprise either.
Just a reminder for you: Engineers are paid to do Intelligent Design, and scientists (who are paid considerably less) generally don't do intelligent design and they definitely aren't trained on ID or how it works. It should be no surprise that they look down on the field.
here.
Which was odd, for it had no real bearing at all on the post being replied to.
Note a couple things:
- A 'dig' about the amount of money paid in each profession
- the requisite conflation of 'intelligent design' done by humans with the 'Intelligent Design' of the IDcreationism movement
- A 'dig' about how 'scientists' are not trained in ID and so 'look down on it'
Generally silly stuff, so I decided to check out the author.
It is one "Looney", a fundamentalist Christian engineer (what else!). I checked out his blog, and lo and behold - he has a post about how molecular biology has nothing to do with "Darwinism" .
He 'knows' this because he picked up a 13 year old textbook on genetics and molecular biology that did not mention Darwinism once. Wow! Clever stuff! Surely, only an engineer could make such an insightful conclusion! Wait - there is more...
"It has a considerable Physical Chemistry and Organic Chemistry component which would make it intimidating for the large majority of biologists, but this subject is really foundational to understanding the molecular foundations of genetics"
Yeah, because us biologists is just so stupid. Why, we don't understand no kem-er-sty. I mean, we don't have any chemistry in our curricula. No physics, either. And math? Never heard of it. But engineers, why, they have all that stuff, not to mention the copious amounts of biology* they are required to study...
(* note - this is graduate level, and only for biomedical engineering)
And it goes on...
"As I suspected, the modern invoking of DNA and molecular biology in support of Darwinism was merely BS. To further support my contention, professor Schleif routinely invokes factories and computer information concepts (intelligently designed all) to help in understanding the basic concepts, whereas Darwinism is entirely absent."
Of course. Just BS. Something made-up by propagandists. And of course the use of EASY TO UNDERSTAND 'intelligent design' analogies and metaphors to help explain those simple biology concepts. Seems to me that if biological concepts were so simplistic, we would be using biology analogies to help explain engineering concepts.
Doesn't work that way, though.
Buit wait - the intellectual coup de grace:
"My hypothesis is that the field of molecular biology is simply not understood by the majority of biologists and thus pretty secure from rational debate by laymen. By claiming that this discipline (which they probably don't understand either) proves Darwinism and that Darwinism is vital to understanding molecular biology, the Creationists can be silenced, humiliated and put in their place by simply invoking superior knowledge. More malpractice?"
Wondderful! Yeah - biologists don't understand.... molecular biology.
Creationists can be humiliated, silenced, and put in their place all on their own - their intellectual dishonesty, their ignorance-based pseudocertainty, their willful ignorance, their outright fabrications and distortions - no, they do not need any help from us. That another creationist engineer doesn't understand a technical subdiscipline of the field of biology is no surprise. What is a surprise is that here is yet another creationist with an engineering background that exhibits nicely what I call the Kruger-Dunning effect (also, 'Loony' is yet another data point for the Salem hypothesis).
No wait - that is not a surprise either.
Thursday, November 16, 2006
More stupid biology claims by non-biologists
I had forgotten about this essay/article I had written some time ago, dealing with that paragon of ignorance-based arrogance, Warren Bergerson.
If you do not with to read it, at least read this statement:
"Whether you introduce 9 variations per life into a 9 letter message or a 30 million letter message the impact is the same. "
- Warren Bergerson
Bergerson - a retired actuary - cannot see the difference between a 100% change and a 0.00003% change. And he dares lecture others on THEIR lack of mathematical knowledge?
If you do not with to read it, at least read this statement:
"Whether you introduce 9 variations per life into a 9 letter message or a 30 million letter message the impact is the same. "
- Warren Bergerson
Bergerson - a retired actuary - cannot see the difference between a 100% change and a 0.00003% change. And he dares lecture others on THEIR lack of mathematical knowledge?
Thursday, November 02, 2006
'Intelligent Design' - the Cult of Personality
The Intelligent Design movement is this:
A religio-political movement spiffied up with the veneer of science.
And a rather thin veneer, at that. When one reads the writings of ID activists and layfolk, one hears primarily hero-worship. One reads how 'great' the folks associated with ID are; how 'heroic' and 'intelligent' the leaders of the movement are, blah blah blah. Their credentials and relative importance in science and culture are routinely embellished to the point of absurdity (referring to Bill Dembski, whose work has been trampled and belittled by mathematicians and sundry scientists alike, as "the Isaac Newton of Information Theory" is a personal favorite).
A few years ago, the 'leaders' of the ID movement seemed unstoppable - testifying before legislative bodies (not to mention state and local school boards), writing numerous well-selling books, presenting numerous well-attended lectures, producing innumerable ID-friendly websites, etc. The movement certainly fired up the grass-roots right-wing religious establishment and gained a lot of support, even planting seeds of doubt into the minds of some in academia and medicine.
Alas, times have changed. Their cards were played a long time ago - all their 'best' arguments - Irreducible Complexity, the 'explanatory filter', the 'impobability' arguments, the 'problems' with evolution - have been used up. They shot their wad, so to speak, early on and have spent the last several years steadfastly, stubbornly, and desperately clinging to these worn out, hackneyed, arguments ever since.
The writing is one the wall. Look at their most active 'official' web sites - ARN and Uncommon Descent. The ARN discussion boards at one time boasted hundreds of active members, including a few actual scientists posting in support of ID, and getting thousands of hits a day.
Lok at it today. There appear to be only about 10 active participants. There are about 5 scientists posting there, all none-too-friendly to ID, and the pro-ID folks posting there are all unabashed young earth creationists (which we are told ID is not about), with 2 possible exceptions - "jon_e" who is a minutiae mongering pain in the neck, and "lifeEngineer" Warren Bergerson, a megalomaniacal retired actuary who has convinced himself that only he and a handful of people in the entire world uinderstand what science is all about, despite the fact that he has never engaged in any scienctific endeavors and cannot actually name a single person that agrees with anythign he writes.
Uncommon Descent, Bill Dembski's blog, has become a laughingstock, with "moderators" that ban anyone that dares question the 'authority' of Saint Bill or disagree with the 'expert' moderators themselves.
A classic example of the apparent fact that ID is little more than a cult of personality can be seen in this post, "Why I’m paying $100 to hear Paul Nelson, November 16, 2006", by Salvador Cordova, founder of the IDEA club movement, who appears to have no job but to post at discussion boards sleazly and creepy accolades of his ID movement heros and, of course, silly pseudoscientific mumbo jumbo purportedly supportive of ID in some way.
Note how Cordova refers to his ID heros, and note how several posters join in the infatuitive 'crush' on these folks:
"Paul Nelson is such a cool and brilliant guy"
That reminds me of that Seinfeld episode where George has a "nonsexual crush" on Elaine's new boyfriend, Tony, wherein Jerry comments to George, after George claims that Tony is such a 'cool guy', "Cool guy? What are you in 8th grade?"
Later in Cordova's adulation piece, after he lists the event attendees (and after explaining that it is an apologetics event - wait, I thought ID was not religious?), he engages in the usual embellishment of his heros:
"The conference has invited speakers who received PhD’s from respectable secular institutions ( 2 from Oxford, 1 for U Penn, 1 from U of Chicago, etc.). They are 22 highly regarded scholars in their field."
GilDodgen, a creationist engineer, comments:
"Paul Nelson is a cool and brilliant guy."
Of several of the other event speakers, he writes:
"He is a first-rate intellect and apologist...
He is brilliant and and insightful...
This is an all-star cast...."
And Cordova's post was only made yesterday - I am sure as the days go on, the adoration and hero-worhsip will only get worse.
The ID movement is stagnant. It has evolved from a reliopolitical movement into a parody of itself. Is has had to resort to hiring a public relations firm (the same one that handled the whole "Swiftboat Veterans..." propaganda campaign - what a coincidence, eh?) to help get its 'message' out, it has resorted to churning out 'attack' books published by right-wing propaganda outlet Regnery with titles such as "The Politically Incorrect Guide to Darwin and Intelligent Design" by failed scientist-wannabe Jon Wells, filled with errors and disinformation, and similarly titled books by the likes of right-wing 'journalist' Tom Bethell.
Where is the science? Where is their evidence? The fact they have to resort to public relations campaigns and disinformation, propaganda books should inform most rational people that they are floundering, and most folks that follow the 'debate' know that this is the case.
The problem lies with the average citizen, who does not understand the scientific issues, who is inclined to accept the pablum spewn by ID movement folks (because it plays to their religious motivations), and who will eagerly take what these folks claim at their word because they are 'good Christian folk.' And this is a big problem - so many of those people do simply trust that what they are told is absolutley true because the person telling them something is a 'Christian.' But he 'Christian' folks associated with the Intelligent Design movement and creationism are no so much wed to teling the truth as they are to spreading their Faith.
I give one classic example of this. It deals specifically with a young earth creationist, but such folks fill the ranks of the ID movement as well.
Steve Austin is a PhD. holding geologist. He also happens to be a young earth creationist who works for the Institute for Creation Research. He gives tours/lectures at their creation 'museum', and among the things he talks about is his "conversion" to YECism. As he tells it, he used to be an old-earth evolutionist (perhaps even an atheist). He then claims that he studied at Mt.St.Helens after the 1980 eruption, and the things he saw there convinced him that the earth could be young, and then he somehow made the great intellwectual leap from old-earth evolutionist to young earth creationist, claiming that it was the 'science' and his research that lead him to YECism. Hallelujah! Not so fast...
As it turns out, he had been writing YEC articles as a college student for as many as 4 years prior to the eruption at Mt.St.Helens under a pseudonym (Stuart Nevins).
When this is pointed out to creationists, they simply dismiss it. Apparently, the 'story' is more important than than the fact that they were lied to (a sad truism for many with a right-wing inclination*).
This is not an entirely uncommon theme in both creationist and ID writings.
We return to our hero, YEC ID cheerleader and hero-worshipper, Salvador Cordova. A few years ago, he was interviewed by a writer from the science journal Nature. The gist of the story was how the ID movement is basically creationism in disguise and its adherents are politically and religiously motived, not scientiifcally so. And the interview made it quite clear that Cordova wazs in it for religious, not scientific reasons.
Nevertheless, Cordova went on a spam-fest, posting a blurb about how ID proponant Salvador Cordova was in the prestigious journal Nature. He did not mention that his motivations were exposed and ID was shown to be a religio-political movement, oh no - those little facts were not mentione din his posts on multiple discussdion boards, newsgroups and blogs. And the hoped-for effect was apparent - pro-ID folks hailed it as a great victory, without bothering to read the actual interview. when the true outome fo the interview was explained, the pro-ID folks called it sour grapes and ignored the facts.
And this is the state of American discourse.
A religio-political movement spiffied up with the veneer of science.
And a rather thin veneer, at that. When one reads the writings of ID activists and layfolk, one hears primarily hero-worship. One reads how 'great' the folks associated with ID are; how 'heroic' and 'intelligent' the leaders of the movement are, blah blah blah. Their credentials and relative importance in science and culture are routinely embellished to the point of absurdity (referring to Bill Dembski, whose work has been trampled and belittled by mathematicians and sundry scientists alike, as "the Isaac Newton of Information Theory" is a personal favorite).
A few years ago, the 'leaders' of the ID movement seemed unstoppable - testifying before legislative bodies (not to mention state and local school boards), writing numerous well-selling books, presenting numerous well-attended lectures, producing innumerable ID-friendly websites, etc. The movement certainly fired up the grass-roots right-wing religious establishment and gained a lot of support, even planting seeds of doubt into the minds of some in academia and medicine.
Alas, times have changed. Their cards were played a long time ago - all their 'best' arguments - Irreducible Complexity, the 'explanatory filter', the 'impobability' arguments, the 'problems' with evolution - have been used up. They shot their wad, so to speak, early on and have spent the last several years steadfastly, stubbornly, and desperately clinging to these worn out, hackneyed, arguments ever since.
The writing is one the wall. Look at their most active 'official' web sites - ARN and Uncommon Descent. The ARN discussion boards at one time boasted hundreds of active members, including a few actual scientists posting in support of ID, and getting thousands of hits a day.
Lok at it today. There appear to be only about 10 active participants. There are about 5 scientists posting there, all none-too-friendly to ID, and the pro-ID folks posting there are all unabashed young earth creationists (which we are told ID is not about), with 2 possible exceptions - "jon_e" who is a minutiae mongering pain in the neck, and "lifeEngineer" Warren Bergerson, a megalomaniacal retired actuary who has convinced himself that only he and a handful of people in the entire world uinderstand what science is all about, despite the fact that he has never engaged in any scienctific endeavors and cannot actually name a single person that agrees with anythign he writes.
Uncommon Descent, Bill Dembski's blog, has become a laughingstock, with "moderators" that ban anyone that dares question the 'authority' of Saint Bill or disagree with the 'expert' moderators themselves.
A classic example of the apparent fact that ID is little more than a cult of personality can be seen in this post, "Why I’m paying $100 to hear Paul Nelson, November 16, 2006", by Salvador Cordova, founder of the IDEA club movement, who appears to have no job but to post at discussion boards sleazly and creepy accolades of his ID movement heros and, of course, silly pseudoscientific mumbo jumbo purportedly supportive of ID in some way.
Note how Cordova refers to his ID heros, and note how several posters join in the infatuitive 'crush' on these folks:
"Paul Nelson is such a cool and brilliant guy"
That reminds me of that Seinfeld episode where George has a "nonsexual crush" on Elaine's new boyfriend, Tony, wherein Jerry comments to George, after George claims that Tony is such a 'cool guy', "Cool guy? What are you in 8th grade?"
Later in Cordova's adulation piece, after he lists the event attendees (and after explaining that it is an apologetics event - wait, I thought ID was not religious?), he engages in the usual embellishment of his heros:
"The conference has invited speakers who received PhD’s from respectable secular institutions ( 2 from Oxford, 1 for U Penn, 1 from U of Chicago, etc.). They are 22 highly regarded scholars in their field."
GilDodgen, a creationist engineer, comments:
"Paul Nelson is a cool and brilliant guy."
Of several of the other event speakers, he writes:
"He is a first-rate intellect and apologist...
He is brilliant and and insightful...
This is an all-star cast...."
And Cordova's post was only made yesterday - I am sure as the days go on, the adoration and hero-worhsip will only get worse.
The ID movement is stagnant. It has evolved from a reliopolitical movement into a parody of itself. Is has had to resort to hiring a public relations firm (the same one that handled the whole "Swiftboat Veterans..." propaganda campaign - what a coincidence, eh?) to help get its 'message' out, it has resorted to churning out 'attack' books published by right-wing propaganda outlet Regnery with titles such as "The Politically Incorrect Guide to Darwin and Intelligent Design" by failed scientist-wannabe Jon Wells, filled with errors and disinformation, and similarly titled books by the likes of right-wing 'journalist' Tom Bethell.
Where is the science? Where is their evidence? The fact they have to resort to public relations campaigns and disinformation, propaganda books should inform most rational people that they are floundering, and most folks that follow the 'debate' know that this is the case.
The problem lies with the average citizen, who does not understand the scientific issues, who is inclined to accept the pablum spewn by ID movement folks (because it plays to their religious motivations), and who will eagerly take what these folks claim at their word because they are 'good Christian folk.' And this is a big problem - so many of those people do simply trust that what they are told is absolutley true because the person telling them something is a 'Christian.' But he 'Christian' folks associated with the Intelligent Design movement and creationism are no so much wed to teling the truth as they are to spreading their Faith.
I give one classic example of this. It deals specifically with a young earth creationist, but such folks fill the ranks of the ID movement as well.
Steve Austin is a PhD. holding geologist. He also happens to be a young earth creationist who works for the Institute for Creation Research. He gives tours/lectures at their creation 'museum', and among the things he talks about is his "conversion" to YECism. As he tells it, he used to be an old-earth evolutionist (perhaps even an atheist). He then claims that he studied at Mt.St.Helens after the 1980 eruption, and the things he saw there convinced him that the earth could be young, and then he somehow made the great intellwectual leap from old-earth evolutionist to young earth creationist, claiming that it was the 'science' and his research that lead him to YECism. Hallelujah! Not so fast...
As it turns out, he had been writing YEC articles as a college student for as many as 4 years prior to the eruption at Mt.St.Helens under a pseudonym (Stuart Nevins).
When this is pointed out to creationists, they simply dismiss it. Apparently, the 'story' is more important than than the fact that they were lied to (a sad truism for many with a right-wing inclination*).
This is not an entirely uncommon theme in both creationist and ID writings.
We return to our hero, YEC ID cheerleader and hero-worshipper, Salvador Cordova. A few years ago, he was interviewed by a writer from the science journal Nature. The gist of the story was how the ID movement is basically creationism in disguise and its adherents are politically and religiously motived, not scientiifcally so. And the interview made it quite clear that Cordova wazs in it for religious, not scientific reasons.
Nevertheless, Cordova went on a spam-fest, posting a blurb about how ID proponant Salvador Cordova was in the prestigious journal Nature. He did not mention that his motivations were exposed and ID was shown to be a religio-political movement, oh no - those little facts were not mentione din his posts on multiple discussdion boards, newsgroups and blogs. And the hoped-for effect was apparent - pro-ID folks hailed it as a great victory, without bothering to read the actual interview. when the true outome fo the interview was explained, the pro-ID folks called it sour grapes and ignored the facts.
And this is the state of American discourse.
Wednesday, November 01, 2006
Whatever Happened to R. David Pogge?
Well, nothing.
Pogge (aka 'Do-While Jones') is the main author of the misinformed propaganda at the Science Against Evolution web site.
Pogge is an electrical engineer, and as nearly all electrical engineers that also happen to be creationists, Pogge considers himself an arbiter of the truth of all things scientifc. I have written about some of the more ridiculous things Pogge has written on topics such as gene duplication and the relevance of the % similarity between human and chimp DNA.
Since I began writing articles for this blog last January, I have emailed Pogge 3 or 4 times, informaing him that I had written about some of his articles and included links to them in my messages. I have never received a response of any kind.
Today, I checked out the Pogge propaganda site and (re)discovered the fact that Pogge writes up replies to many emails he receives. I looked through the archives there, and there is no mention of my articles debunking and exposing his silly claims (that I could find, anyway).
Better for him I suppose - it would be detrimental to let his more dimwitted readers know that his claims have been responsded to.
Pogge (aka 'Do-While Jones') is the main author of the misinformed propaganda at the Science Against Evolution web site.
Pogge is an electrical engineer, and as nearly all electrical engineers that also happen to be creationists, Pogge considers himself an arbiter of the truth of all things scientifc. I have written about some of the more ridiculous things Pogge has written on topics such as gene duplication and the relevance of the % similarity between human and chimp DNA.
Since I began writing articles for this blog last January, I have emailed Pogge 3 or 4 times, informaing him that I had written about some of his articles and included links to them in my messages. I have never received a response of any kind.
Today, I checked out the Pogge propaganda site and (re)discovered the fact that Pogge writes up replies to many emails he receives. I looked through the archives there, and there is no mention of my articles debunking and exposing his silly claims (that I could find, anyway).
Better for him I suppose - it would be detrimental to let his more dimwitted readers know that his claims have been responsded to.
Total eclipses occur, so evolution is false?
Amazingly, this is but one of the incredibly silly arguments put forth (in so many words) by Guillermo Gonzalez, co-author of the anthropic-principle-writ-large "Privileged Planet" (co-written by a philosopher/theologian, no less...), against "Darwinian evolution." What, precisely, eclipses have to do with biological evolution is anyone's guess, but creationists go to extreme and illogical lengths to try to tie nearly anything to their cause.
This article sums up some of Gonzalez's awe-based arguments.
Amazing...
This article sums up some of Gonzalez's awe-based arguments.
Amazing...
Saturday, October 28, 2006
I remember when Dennis Miller used to be funny
Dennis Miller, of Saturday Night Live fame, was at one time one of my favorite comedians. His sarcastic wit, his arcane cultural references, and use of language made him, in my opinion, one of the best in the business.
Of course, back then, he had a bit of a left-lean. I recall one of his HBO specials - "Dennis Miller: Black and White" - in which he explained that he would not ask pro-lifers for directions, much less their opinions on an unborn child, and that plans to put Ronald Reagan's head on Mt. Rushmore (yes, that was actually considered by the Reagan worshipping Gingrich congress!) were scrapped because it was discovered that 'granite was not a dense enough material to accurately portray the former president's head...'.
Alas, as time goes by, many people change, and not always for the better.
Some time between when I saw Miller live on the campus of Michigan State University ~1991 and about 2001, Dennis Miller became a conservative.
And along with that change, went his comedic genius.
Witty political rejoinders regarding the dim-wittedness of Alaska Senator Ted Stevens were gone, to be replaced with right-wing knee-slappers like responding to a comment that higher gas prices might be good for the environment and cut down on our reliance on foreign oil with a haughty intellectual "What is it with this Communist crap?"*
Wow, Dennis, insightful, clever stuff.
And now this.
Hinting that Nancy Pelosi is a 'nimrod' with a low IQ ranks right up there with another draft-dodging right-winger, Bruce Willis, urging people to vote for Bush 1 instead of Clinton/Gore because they are 'bozos.'
It seems that becoming a conservative makes a funny one no longer funny. The things that make conservatives laugh make most intelligent people whince in disgust, or stare blankly, wondering when the actual funny things are going to be said.
It is a shame. Miller was once worth listening to. Now, he is just a sad shadow of what once was. Right-wingery does that to you.
*This was on one of Miller's various short-lived talk shows, somewhere in the 2003-4 range. Unfortunatley, I forget the name of the show, as well as the name of the guest, but I distinctly remember Miller's idiotic reply, as it struck me as so uttelry irrelevant. It was at that time that I was certain Miller was no longer funny.
Of course, back then, he had a bit of a left-lean. I recall one of his HBO specials - "Dennis Miller: Black and White" - in which he explained that he would not ask pro-lifers for directions, much less their opinions on an unborn child, and that plans to put Ronald Reagan's head on Mt. Rushmore (yes, that was actually considered by the Reagan worshipping Gingrich congress!) were scrapped because it was discovered that 'granite was not a dense enough material to accurately portray the former president's head...'.
Alas, as time goes by, many people change, and not always for the better.
Some time between when I saw Miller live on the campus of Michigan State University ~1991 and about 2001, Dennis Miller became a conservative.
And along with that change, went his comedic genius.
Witty political rejoinders regarding the dim-wittedness of Alaska Senator Ted Stevens were gone, to be replaced with right-wing knee-slappers like responding to a comment that higher gas prices might be good for the environment and cut down on our reliance on foreign oil with a haughty intellectual "What is it with this Communist crap?"*
Wow, Dennis, insightful, clever stuff.
And now this.
Hinting that Nancy Pelosi is a 'nimrod' with a low IQ ranks right up there with another draft-dodging right-winger, Bruce Willis, urging people to vote for Bush 1 instead of Clinton/Gore because they are 'bozos.'
It seems that becoming a conservative makes a funny one no longer funny. The things that make conservatives laugh make most intelligent people whince in disgust, or stare blankly, wondering when the actual funny things are going to be said.
It is a shame. Miller was once worth listening to. Now, he is just a sad shadow of what once was. Right-wingery does that to you.
*This was on one of Miller's various short-lived talk shows, somewhere in the 2003-4 range. Unfortunatley, I forget the name of the show, as well as the name of the guest, but I distinctly remember Miller's idiotic reply, as it struck me as so uttelry irrelevant. It was at that time that I was certain Miller was no longer funny.
Friday, October 20, 2006
Colbert misinterepreted by Intelligent Design Creationist
So, what is new? It is not the first time that a right-wing rube has confused Colbert's satire and parody of right-wing TV/radio hosts with a humourous pro-right agenda.
But you'd think they wouldf have figured it out by now.
Apparently not.
'Scott' over at Dembski's blog has posted a video clip of Colbert's interview with Richard Dawkins, and titled it "Colbert Has Fun With Dawkins’s Delusions."
Please, watch the clip and ask yourself if you think Colbert's role was to make Dawkin's claims look delusional...
But you'd think they wouldf have figured it out by now.
Apparently not.
'Scott' over at Dembski's blog has posted a video clip of Colbert's interview with Richard Dawkins, and titled it "Colbert Has Fun With Dawkins’s Delusions."
Please, watch the clip and ask yourself if you think Colbert's role was to make Dawkin's claims look delusional...
Looks like another loony is running the asylum
Incredible....
"He [Rumsfeld]leads in a way that the good Lord tells him is best for our country," said Marine General Peter Pace, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
"He [Rumsfeld]leads in a way that the good Lord tells him is best for our country," said Marine General Peter Pace, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
Thursday, October 19, 2006
Gotta love the logic of the Intelligent Design Creationist
I don't often read the entries, much less the comments, at Bill Dembski's blog. It, quite literally, almost makes me nauseous. The amount of projection, double standards, sycophantic adulation of heros, repeated errors, and sheer dishonesty spewn there is just too much to handle on a regular basis.
But I read a post on another dicsussion board commenting on a post Dembski had made regarding Groupthink. Creationists of all stripes like ot declare that the only (or one of the only) reasons that 'Darwinism' is still around is due to the 'groupthink' of its adherents. And Dembski's post insinuated just this (Real Mathematician Jason Rosenhouse does a nice take-down of the notion on his excellent blog and shows that, as so often is the case, Dembski and his coterie of sycophants are just projecting). The great irony being, of course, that the criteria apply far more directly and handily to Dembski and the cult of 'Intelligent Design.'
But what really interested me were some of the comments. The discussion devolved into the usual IDcreationism v. evolution, which is fine, but the following exchanges get to the heart of the title of this post. The first is by 'Houdin', an evolution supporter (I have edited the comments only for readability):
This reply by an IDcreationist, relies on and points one of the primary types of "evidence" employed bvy the IDcreationist:
And just who are the "intelligent agents" that can be pointed to that make CSI?
Well, 'Mike' doesn't say, but the standard - in fact the ONLY - such agent they can and have ever referred to is Humans. Thats right - humans are their "evidence" for Intelligent Design"... of the bacterial flagellum and everything else.
Because you see humans produce CSI, humans make comlicated and complex things.
Bacterial flagella and other such stuff is real complicated and complex, therefore, they must have been made by an Intelligent Agent. One just like us... Except much better. And just who might these folks posit such an Intelligent Agent might be? Well, the more political saavy IDcreaionists won't say, at least in public...
It is a big argument by analogy.
Which any intelligent, rational person should see is no argument at all. But it is all they have, and they really, really like using it.
Reason #672 why 'Intelligent Design' does not deserve to be called science, and why it does not belong in public school curricula.
But I read a post on another dicsussion board commenting on a post Dembski had made regarding Groupthink. Creationists of all stripes like ot declare that the only (or one of the only) reasons that 'Darwinism' is still around is due to the 'groupthink' of its adherents. And Dembski's post insinuated just this (Real Mathematician Jason Rosenhouse does a nice take-down of the notion on his excellent blog and shows that, as so often is the case, Dembski and his coterie of sycophants are just projecting). The great irony being, of course, that the criteria apply far more directly and handily to Dembski and the cult of 'Intelligent Design.'
But what really interested me were some of the comments. The discussion devolved into the usual IDcreationism v. evolution, which is fine, but the following exchanges get to the heart of the title of this post. The first is by 'Houdin', an evolution supporter (I have edited the comments only for readability):
85. Houdin // Oct 18th 2006 at 5:48 am
Joseph says [my comments in brackets]
1)High information content (or specified complexity) and irreducible complexity constitute strong indicators or hallmarks of (past) intelligent design.
[Specified complexity and irreducible complexity are produced by Darwinian
evolution.]
2) Biological systems have a high information content (or specified complexity) and utilize subsystems that manifest irreducible complexity.
[Agreed]
3) Naturalistic mechanisms or undirected causes do not suffice to explain the origin of information (specified complexity) or irreducible complexity.
[Science says they do. If ID says otherwise, please show us some evidence to support this claim.]
4) Therefore, intelligent design constitutes the best explanations for the origin of information and irreducible complexity in biological systems.
[Therefore we have two competing claims. One claim is that a designer is responsible for the specified complexity we find in living organisms. The other theory says that variation and natural selection is responsible. We can show you the second theory at work. ID has no examples of the Designer at work.]
Comment by Houdin — October 18, 2006 @ 5:48 am
This reply by an IDcreationist, relies on and points one of the primary types of "evidence" employed bvy the IDcreationist:
86. mike1962 // Oct 18th 2006 at 8:21 am
Houdin: “[Specified complexity and irreducible complexity are produced by Darwinian evolution.]”
I can demonstrate all day long CSI made by intelligent agents. Can you do the same for NDE? Conjecture doesn’t count as a demonstration.
Houdin: “3) Naturalistic mechanisms or undirected causes do not suffice to
explain the origin of information (specified complexity) or irreducible
complexity.[Science says they do.]”
No. Darwinian “science” merely conjectures that they do. There is lots and lots of hard evidence that intelligence agents can create CSI. There is none for NDE mechanisms. Therefore, so far, ID is the best explanation for the CSI in found in bio-forms.
And just who are the "intelligent agents" that can be pointed to that make CSI?
Well, 'Mike' doesn't say, but the standard - in fact the ONLY - such agent they can and have ever referred to is Humans. Thats right - humans are their "evidence" for Intelligent Design"... of the bacterial flagellum and everything else.
Because you see humans produce CSI, humans make comlicated and complex things.
Bacterial flagella and other such stuff is real complicated and complex, therefore, they must have been made by an Intelligent Agent. One just like us... Except much better. And just who might these folks posit such an Intelligent Agent might be? Well, the more political saavy IDcreaionists won't say, at least in public...
It is a big argument by analogy.
Which any intelligent, rational person should see is no argument at all. But it is all they have, and they really, really like using it.
Reason #672 why 'Intelligent Design' does not deserve to be called science, and why it does not belong in public school curricula.
Wednesday, September 27, 2006
Monday, September 25, 2006
The Politically Incorrect Guide to Darwinism and Intelligent Design, by Jon 'Draft Dodger' Wells
Jon Wells, of 10-years-to-get-a-PhD-with-only-2-coauthored-papers-to-show-for-it and a 'mission to destroy Darwinism' fame has recently written The Politically Incorrect Guide to Darwinism and Intelligent Design, published by standard 'anything goes as long as it is pro-Conservative' Regnery Publishing.
It is standard right-wing creationist propaganda - misleading, false, idiotic, and inflammatory to its core, like the other PIG books (like this one on U.S. history, for example) , as they have become known.
The Panda's Thumb, a 'pro-evolution' website/blog, has been posting deconstructions and demolitions of Wells' latest pulp fiction.
They are good reads, and each installation demonstrates the depths to which this member of the Intelligent Design movement, and members of right-wing movements in general, will go to in order to promote their preferred ideology. It should give honest conservatives pause...
It is standard right-wing creationist propaganda - misleading, false, idiotic, and inflammatory to its core, like the other PIG books (like this one on U.S. history, for example) , as they have become known.
The Panda's Thumb, a 'pro-evolution' website/blog, has been posting deconstructions and demolitions of Wells' latest pulp fiction.
They are good reads, and each installation demonstrates the depths to which this member of the Intelligent Design movement, and members of right-wing movements in general, will go to in order to promote their preferred ideology. It should give honest conservatives pause...
Thursday, September 14, 2006
I guess I was wrong - the concept of "Intelligent Design" really is useful...
I guess I was just plain wrong about this.
The ID paradigm really is an amazingly useful tool for scientific endeavors, and therefore by extension, naturalistic evolution really is false. How could I have been so wrong all this time? I just thought that ID was a way to sneak religion into public school science classes - how wrong I was!
Here is how I now know this.
Yesterday, I had some time to kill and did a little intellectual autoflagellation at Dembski's den of sycophantic simpletons (i.e., Bill Dembski's blog), and I ended up following a couple of links to "Mike Gene's" most recent blog, The Design Matrix.
Its main purpose seems to be publicity for his upcoming book of the same title*, but what intrigued me was this page, and specifically, the entry titled Example of Design Detection.
Now let me inform you what the entry page to this blog said re: Gene's new book:
"What clues might lead to a suspicion that Life was intelligently designed? Is it possible to move beyond the suspicion?..."
So, MY suspicion was that Mike Gene may have actually produced - for the very first time - evidence that a 'design' paradigm actually produced results - maybe he actually came up with some concrete evidence for 'design in nature' - evidence that Life really was the product of Intelligence! How exciting!!
Imagine how I felt when, upon clicking the link for the entry, and seeing only a link.
I was a bit suspicious, but what the heck.
Then imagine my surprise when I saw that the link that Gene provided as an example of design detection was on a political blog, in an article titled:
Reuters Doctoring Photos from Beirut?
An article about how it was discovered that a photographer had doctored photos.
Color me impressed! Color me astonished! Color me converted!
I mean, if it was only via an Intelligent Design paradigm, as Gene implies in the title, that this act of photoshopping was discovered, what other biologically relevant discoveries will adopting metaphorical terminology and relying on analogies as evidence provide for humanity!?!?
And Mike Gene is no slouch - why, anti-Darwinian theologian William 'Isaac Newton of Information Theory' Dembski says of him " Mike Gene is the pseudonym of one of the most insightful individuals in the ID/evolution debate."
Wow.
I guess he would know...
Let's get this new book in public schools immediately!
NOT!
*a book wherein Gene apparently talks about his 'suspicion' of design....
The ID paradigm really is an amazingly useful tool for scientific endeavors, and therefore by extension, naturalistic evolution really is false. How could I have been so wrong all this time? I just thought that ID was a way to sneak religion into public school science classes - how wrong I was!
Here is how I now know this.
Yesterday, I had some time to kill and did a little intellectual autoflagellation at Dembski's den of sycophantic simpletons (i.e., Bill Dembski's blog), and I ended up following a couple of links to "Mike Gene's" most recent blog, The Design Matrix.
Its main purpose seems to be publicity for his upcoming book of the same title*, but what intrigued me was this page, and specifically, the entry titled Example of Design Detection.
Now let me inform you what the entry page to this blog said re: Gene's new book:
"What clues might lead to a suspicion that Life was intelligently designed? Is it possible to move beyond the suspicion?..."
So, MY suspicion was that Mike Gene may have actually produced - for the very first time - evidence that a 'design' paradigm actually produced results - maybe he actually came up with some concrete evidence for 'design in nature' - evidence that Life really was the product of Intelligence! How exciting!!
Imagine how I felt when, upon clicking the link for the entry, and seeing only a link.
I was a bit suspicious, but what the heck.
Then imagine my surprise when I saw that the link that Gene provided as an example of design detection was on a political blog, in an article titled:
Reuters Doctoring Photos from Beirut?
An article about how it was discovered that a photographer had doctored photos.
Color me impressed! Color me astonished! Color me converted!
I mean, if it was only via an Intelligent Design paradigm, as Gene implies in the title, that this act of photoshopping was discovered, what other biologically relevant discoveries will adopting metaphorical terminology and relying on analogies as evidence provide for humanity!?!?
And Mike Gene is no slouch - why, anti-Darwinian theologian William 'Isaac Newton of Information Theory' Dembski says of him " Mike Gene is the pseudonym of one of the most insightful individuals in the ID/evolution debate."
Wow.
I guess he would know...
Let's get this new book in public schools immediately!
NOT!
*a book wherein Gene apparently talks about his 'suspicion' of design....
Wednesday, September 13, 2006
How to make wild, ridiculous extrapolations
Step 1: be a creationist
Step 2: be a creationist with no relevant background, training, experience, or education in any field related to evolution or biology
Step 3: Be 1 and 2 above and have a background in something like computer programming
Step 4: Convince yourself that because of your true background, you have some sort of unique and special insight into things that you have no background in
Step 5: Read some news releases on highly technical issues related to things you have no background in. For example, read an interesting article about 'jumping genes' - an idea that has been around for awhile, but for which there was little supporing evidence.
Step 6: take the information in an article like the one above, and make broad, wild, unsupportable sweeping generalizations like this:
"Also to point out, ALL phylogenies based on homology are based on the idea of random mutations (if organism X has the exact same pattern (tissue, bone structure, etc.) as organism Y it must be because of a shared common ancestor with that pattern. If random mutation is not correct, then it is very possible that two children could “evolve” the _exact same_ organ independently. Thus, if random mutations are found to be directed, then pretty much all phylogenetic trees need to be re-examined, and perhaps even the notion of morphological tree-building would be called into question. "
Wow.
Toss everything out the window because of one unique discovery? Hypothetically possible. Of course, in this case, one will have to ignore the fact that the methods questioned have been tested on knowns and found to be pretty darn accurate and reliable.
But should 'jumping genes' really be considered on the same level as synapomorphic mutations?
Should we discount paternity testing because a computer programmer implies that 'jumping genes' calls into question every aspect of genomics?
Hardly.
If anything, the comment above merely shows the extent to which an unyielding allegiance to biblical literalism can distort one's perception of reality.
Step 2: be a creationist with no relevant background, training, experience, or education in any field related to evolution or biology
Step 3: Be 1 and 2 above and have a background in something like computer programming
Step 4: Convince yourself that because of your true background, you have some sort of unique and special insight into things that you have no background in
Step 5: Read some news releases on highly technical issues related to things you have no background in. For example, read an interesting article about 'jumping genes' - an idea that has been around for awhile, but for which there was little supporing evidence.
Step 6: take the information in an article like the one above, and make broad, wild, unsupportable sweeping generalizations like this:
"Also to point out, ALL phylogenies based on homology are based on the idea of random mutations (if organism X has the exact same pattern (tissue, bone structure, etc.) as organism Y it must be because of a shared common ancestor with that pattern. If random mutation is not correct, then it is very possible that two children could “evolve” the _exact same_ organ independently. Thus, if random mutations are found to be directed, then pretty much all phylogenetic trees need to be re-examined, and perhaps even the notion of morphological tree-building would be called into question. "
Wow.
Toss everything out the window because of one unique discovery? Hypothetically possible. Of course, in this case, one will have to ignore the fact that the methods questioned have been tested on knowns and found to be pretty darn accurate and reliable.
But should 'jumping genes' really be considered on the same level as synapomorphic mutations?
Should we discount paternity testing because a computer programmer implies that 'jumping genes' calls into question every aspect of genomics?
Hardly.
If anything, the comment above merely shows the extent to which an unyielding allegiance to biblical literalism can distort one's perception of reality.
Wednesday, August 30, 2006
Berlinski - still a pompous twit
David Berlinski, pseudointellecual darling of the right and associate of the Discovery Institute, has submitted a letter to Science that I really hope will either not get published or will be responded to in devastating form by actual scientists.
Berlinski is an anti-Darwin apologist, one who still employs moronic anti-evolution arguments that even the hack propagandists at Answers in Genesis have disavowed.
Of note is how he ends his letter, in reference to statements by Ken Miller (an actual scientist):
"Such an excess of stupidity is rarely to be found in nature."
Actually, David, it is found in Nature. In fact, David, it is found in abundance at the Discovery Institute.
Berlinski is an anti-Darwin apologist, one who still employs moronic anti-evolution arguments that even the hack propagandists at Answers in Genesis have disavowed.
Of note is how he ends his letter, in reference to statements by Ken Miller (an actual scientist):
"Such an excess of stupidity is rarely to be found in nature."
Actually, David, it is found in Nature. In fact, David, it is found in abundance at the Discovery Institute.
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