Science. It works.

Love it.

Futility

For a while there I got right into the arguments with Dawkinswatch, but eventually I realized that nothing I said ever actually sunk in. In fact it barely registered. DW kept applying non-sequitors and changing the subject by way of argument, and I realized that all I was doing was increasing traffic to his nonsense. So I dropped it, in hopes that maybe ignoring the stupidity would decrease the attention it was getting.

And then he posts this, blathering on, once again, about how evolution is just racism.

In reply to this, I have little recourse but to draw on the wisdon of lolcats:

Discovery Institute out of the closet

For much of it’s history, the discovery institute has been pushing for the teaching of Intelligent Design in schools, claiming that the reason is scientific and not religious. Evidence, such as the Wedge Document, has been dismissed by the DI as a smear campaign and an urban legend.

The Discovery Institute has maintained all along that their focus on Intelligent Design is a viable, scientific alternative to “Darwinism”, and is not based on a religious viewpoint. The DI has a branch called the Center for Science and Culture, which in turn has a division called Faith + Evolution. This site comes right out and explains that the reason for ID research is that evolution and faith are incompatible, and of course faith is correct, and thus evolution is not. In other words, the Discovery institute, in a round about sort of way, is coming out and finally admitting that their science-bashing is religiously motivated.

Ironically, it seems that their incentive for this claim of incompatibility is a response to BioLogos, a Christian website promoting evolution (it is not the only one, by the way. There is also the ASA). So now we have the Christian motivation of the DI out in the open, in an effort to put down another Christian organization, presumably for not being “christian enough” to ignore the evidence for evolution.

Go figure.

Stupid Quote of the Decade

Don McLeroy, chair of the Board of Education in Texas has this to say about Science:

Somebody has to stand up to the experts!

He even goes on to describe these experts as

…very brilliant, wonderful people

who certainly know a shitload more about evolution than McLeroy too, but somebody has to stand up to ‘em. Just ’cause.

Video courtesy of the wonderful people at the NCSE

Why Quackery spreads faster than Science

It seems counterintuitive, but it explains a lot. A new mathematical model explains the spread of useless quackery not becuase it seems to work, but in fact because it is useless.

In short, people emulate each other. If you see me taking a medicine for an illness, you are likely to try the same remedy. The longer I stay sick, the more people I will meet, and the more people will see me taking the treatment. If I am cured quickly, I may only pass along the effective treatment to one or two people. If I am not cured, I may pass along the ineffective treatment to dozens.

The study says that this is not always the case, though it nevertheless goes a long way to explaining the widespread belief in useless folk remedies.

Yikes, it’s creeping North!

In a blow to common sense, the Alberta government has passed a bill that allows parents to request their child be exempted from classes that include topics of evolution or homosexuality.

Although falling short of removing or muzzling these topics in the classroom, it impacts not only Science classes, but Phys-Ed, Health, Geography, and Social Science as well. Some of these may be compulsory courses.

It seems to me, as an educator, that closed-minded prejudice should be all the more reason to take those courses and learn more about the concepts, rather than an excuse to ignore them and continue misunderstanding them.

What’s next, exemption from History class that discusses Sumerian civilization (7400 years ago), or the settling of the Americas (>10,000 years ago)? Or exemption from a course that discusses the Moon landings? 

If you don’t like reality that’s your problem. But government approval to turn a blind eye to it – that’s just not right.

Creationists in Government Cont’d

Reader Darell Bellaart submitted a link to his newspaper article here, and a Globe and Mail article can be found here.

Originally I thought perhaps Lunney was the greater offender for speaking against evolution and science, while Gary Goodyear (also a chiropractor, by the way) merely avoided the question. But it turns out that Goodyear later said, on CTV’s PowerPlay:

We are evolving every year, every decade. That’s a fact, whether it is to the intensity of the sun, whether it is to, as a chiropractor, walking on cement versus anything else, whether it is running shoes or high heels – of course we are evolving to our environment.

Goodyear, by the way, is our Minister of Science and Technology.

It’s at times like this when I feel (insert Antonia Banderas voice) I am so ashamed to be a Canadian.

Creationists in Government

In a recent address in the House of Commons, James Lunney, long-standing conservative MP for Nanaimo-Alberni made the following statement:

Mr. Speaker, recently we saw an attempt to ridicule the presumed beliefs of a member of this House and the belief of millions of Canadians in a creator. Certain individuals in the media and the scientific community have exposed their own arrogance and intolerance of beliefs contrary to their own. Any scientist who declares that the theory of evolution is a fact has already abandoned the foundations of science. For science establishes fact through the study of things observable and reproducible. Since origins can neither be reproduced nor observed, they remain the realm of hypothesis.

In science, it is perfectly acceptable to make assumptions when we do not have all the facts, but it is never acceptable to forget our assumptions. Given the modern evidence unavailable to Darwin, advanced models of plate techtonics, polonium radiohalos, polystratic fossils, I am prepared to believe that Darwin would be willing to re-examine his assumptions.

The evolutionists may disagree, but neither can produce Darwin as a witness to prove his point. The evolutionists may genuinely see his ancestor in a monkey, but many modern scientists interpret the same evidence in favour of creation and a creator.

In general, the phenomenon of faith-based antiscience is American in origin, due to the constitutional separation of church and state. Here north of the 49th* parallel, most of our school boards have a religious origin, so that religious content can be presented as such, and not substituted for science. However, the phenomenon is not uniquely confined to the US.

As PZ Meyers points out, we cannot afford to be complacent, even though we are on the periphery. When Lunney spoke in the House, he was speaking in his professional capacity as a representative of his constituency, and of the governing party of this country. For someone in his position, taking an antiscience stance is unacceptable, and does a disservice to his constituency and to his country. If you are a citizen of the Great White North, or ideally a constituent of Nanaimo-Alberni, I suggest you may want to write him and let him know that he is completely wrong. His contact information is here. 

 Interestingly, you may notice on his site that he is Dr.James Lunney. It turns out he is a Doctor of Chiropractic – a field that has itself been criticized for unscientific claims.

 

*Although most of Canada lies north of the 49th parallel, the line that forms the southern border of Manitoba, Saskatchewan, Alberta and BC, not all of it does. I am actually sitting at 43.75N.

I call Poe on Edward Current

 

Poe’s Law, for those unfamiliar with it, states:

Without a winking smiley or other blatant display of humor, it is impossible to create a parody of Fundamentalism that SOMEONE won’t mistake for the real thing.

This has become a popular meme in the skeptosphere, and is used to illustrate that many arguments for fundamentalism, creationism, and pseudoscience are so completely whacked one has to wonder if they are serious.

One great head-scratching perpetrator of Poe-worthiness is Edward Current. Current is some sort of christian comedian wannabe who has posted a number of glib, silly videos on youtube in an attempt to mock atheism. His points, however, are so juvenile that one wonders if he actually believes them himself. As a case in point, his video The Atheist Delusion  contains the phrases “Science and Reason have no place in our lives”, and “It’s the 21st century, let’s make it feel like the 14th”. I would say that these two statements alone flag it as a clear Poe, except that in the same video he calls Stephen Hawking a freak - something no self-respecting creation-satirist would do.

Update: So it turn sout that Current IS in fact a satyrist. I am slightly embarrased at being taken in, but I can now laugh even louder at his stuff, and watch it with a new appreciation. Though I still say shame on him for mocking the Hawking!

Finding teh Stoopid

The other day, I came across what I thought was one of the stoopidest things I had ever read. It was an anti-evolution diatribe, and it contained a statement to the effect of

Scientists expect us to believe them about evolution, but ho wcan we when they tell us about stuff like DNA. The A in DNA stands for acid, and you know what happens when you come in contact with acid!

At the time, I was in a rush to complete something else, and I thought I would come back and mock it later. For the life of me I can’t find it in my history or by searching. Bummer. I thought I might put it to the readership (“finding the source of the quote as paraphrased above is left as an exercise for th ereader”). All six of you. But then I thought it might be fun to ask readers to find their own cases of stoopid.

So here is the challenge: find the stooopidest quotes you can that present an argument against an established scientific principle, and add it as a comment to this post. Have fun, but have your asbestos brain protectors ready.