Tucson Weekly story — The Panda's Thumb (Legacy Archive)

I would like to alert readers to a feature story that came out today in the Tuscon Weekly. “Evolution Revolution” reviews the evolution/creationism issue nationally and in Arizona, and takes the time to explore issues in a bit of depth. Project Steve gets a mention, always a bonus.

7 Comments

Great White Wonder · 16 February 2005

That is a good article. The best quote from Big Bill was this one

Mathematician William Dembski, a leader in the intelligent-design community, never gets tired of debate. "This is what I was made for," he says. "I'm charged ... I enjoy the rough and tumble of debate."

Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahhahahahhahahahahahahahahahahahahhahaahhaahahahahahahahhahahahahahaahahaha!!!!!! That may be the biggest bunch of baloney I've ever heard Big Bill utter. C'mon Bill. We know you read this blog. You're allegedly a professor at some university. Give us a compelling argument as to why an explanation for the diversity of life on earth which relies on mysterious alien beings to explain a phenomenon that you find surprising is science. Let's hear it Bill. Either that or come clean and admit your theory is pure garbage which a critical high schooler can debunk in two seconds. I beg you, Bill: show me that there's a religious fundamentalist out there with some sense of shame. If Jesus is who your holy book sets him out to be, I think he'd appreciate such a gesture on your part. Or you can show me where he told people like you go forth and tell lies about scientists.

jonas · 17 February 2005

Oh my,

this guy is really a fine example of people tending to criticize others for the flaws they are themselves most prone to - in this case an IDer accusing scientists to adhere to their explanations only because of metaphysical prejudice.

Cary · 17 February 2005

It's funny how he seems compelled to bring up non-scientific reasons for ID.

Is his fall-back position for promoting bad since that we need it socialogically? I would think that *more* dishonest is not what is needed at all!

Konrad Crist · 17 February 2005

It would be interesting to hear how William Dembski (or any other creationist) explains the "science" in the Bible illustrated by Genesis 30 37:39. This passage appears to explain a biblical theory of genetic inheritance. Since I have heard no creationist/ID proponent complain that the science underlying genetic inheritance is wrong, how do they make this passage fit?

Keanus · 17 February 2005

The author of this article, Deidre Pike, should get a better job. She deserves it. Her article was one of the best and most accurate ones I've seen in some time, better than the national media in describing the conflict, the major players, and capturing the right quotes to give the flavor of each. This particular piece merits syndication to a wider audience since so many reporters can never get their " . . . isms" straight or who the bad guys are.

DaveScot · 19 February 2005

Specified complexity is not a biblical concept.

If you are playing poker and lose to someone who gets dealt 15 royal flushes in a row and are willing to say to yourself he was just real lucky and there was no cheating involved then you are, quite simply, a fool.

If you start tallying up the (im)probabilities of life as we know it coming about through chance it makes that run of royal flushes look positively commonplace.

My mama didn't raise any fools. When presented with the overwhelming appearance of design the most rational assumption to make, until proven otherwise, is that it is a design. When confronted with the overwhelming improbability of something happening by random chance the most rational assumption to make, until proven otherwise, is it did not happen by random chance.

Dave S. · 19 February 2005

If you are playing poker and lose to someone who gets dealt 15 royal flushes in a row and are willing to say to yourself he was just real lucky and there was no cheating involved then you are, quite simply, a fool.
— DaveScot

Is anyone here arguing that? What does it have to do with life?

If you start tallying up the (im)probabilities of life as we know it coming about through chance it makes that run of royal flushes look positively commonplace.

Arguments of this type simply beg the question. It should come as no shock to anyone that life is fine-tuned by the properties of the universe. Now if life were not compatible with the properties of the universe, then you'd have a case for design. Your argument would be valid if life appeared on the Earth in some predetermined form, and by chance just happened to be exactly that which could exist in this place in space and time, which was selected at random from a near infinite set of possibilities. That's not what happened. The origin of life and the properties of the universe are not separate independent events that just happened to coincide. It's the difference between asking what the probability of getting a particular hand is before the draw, or after. All we have to go on is what we see after the draw. It makes no sense then to say our hand is so improbable to get without cheating, we must have cheated.

My mama didn't raise any fools.

Nahh...too easy.

When presented with the overwhelming appearance of design the most rational assumption to make, until proven otherwise, is that it is a design. When confronted with the overwhelming improbability of something happening by random chance the most rational assumption to make, until proven otherwise, is it did not happen by random chance.

I have a big granite rock sitting in my garden. It has tens of thousands of crystals of quartz and mica and feldspar, all interlocked so tightly without a trace of gaps between them. There's no way that that bunch of separate crystals could have randomly arrayed themselves so that there's not so much as a micrometer of space between any crystal that I can see. It screams design, so it's most probably designed. That's the most rational assumption, right?