SUCKERED

Posted 1 April 2007 by

↗ The current version of this post is on the live site: https://pandasthumb.org/archives/2007/04/suckered.html

OK, well, we have to admit it, this time our adversaries at the Discovery Institute completely fooled us. For several weeks many of us have been involved in a back-and-forth with Michael Egnor, a neurosurgeon at Stony Brook who, ironically, displayed an amazingly thick skull about anything concerning evolutionary biology. Not only did he deny the obvious facts of evolution and its importance for medicine and biology, but he kept contradicting himself, repeating empty statements, ignoring the evidence and demanding answers to questions which had been already answered many times over. It was maddening to think that a person with a high-level degree and an academic position in a major educational and research institution could be such a know-nothing fool. Well, he isn't, apparently. It was all a ruse by ID advocates to see how far they could pull our chain, and lead us to take his progressively more outlandish statements for real. The Discovery Institute Media Complaint Division site has now come clean, admitting to the prank and giving us a well-deserved raspberry. We should have known better: imagine having a guy who denies the obvious homology of our neural system to that of other vertebrates in charge of slicing off chunks of it in an operating room! Or someone who doesn't believe bacteria evolve resistance to antibiotics dealing with the risk of post-operatory infections. While we are ashamed to have fallen for such a crass caricature of a "dumb Creationist", and apologize to our readers for the time wasted in countering his ludicrous arguments, we applaud the cleverness of the ID folks involved in this April Fool's joke and their effortless impersonation of such a character. How stupid of us not to have thought of that! The PT Crew April 2nd Update: The above post is part of our April Fools' prank on you, our readers. The Discovery Institute did not admit that Egnor was pranking us. That faux page was part of our ruse. Read all the comments in this thread to see who fell for it and who didn't. Also check out this post, where we come clean.

105 Comments

Elf Eye · 1 April 2007

But how are we supposed to tell when advocates of ID are NOT joking? The arguments that are supposedly for real are just as silly as the ones that are supposed to be jokes. Is there some sort of 'design' test we can apply?

Divid Stanton · 1 April 2007

Wow, for a place that "accurately delivers misinformation" they do an awesome job. Now I know why realpc was always trying to tell us what Egnor really meant. Obviously he was in on this scam all along. No wonder his arguments were so absurd.

Just one question, doesn't Egnor really exist? Didn't we get all kinds of details about his publication record and hear all about the people in his department? Was he in on this as well? Man that guy must have a real sense of humor. Oh well, no matter who scammed who or why this still looks really bad for ID and the DI.

Johnny · 1 April 2007

"Regardless of how ridiculous my posts were, the Darwinians seriously thought that I was sincere. "

I think it speaks volumes when a parody of a creationist cannot be distinguished from the real thing.

Joseph Beres · 1 April 2007

Bravo Guest Contributor, had me going for a little while.

ben · 1 April 2007

Or is Egnor for real and the DI's April 1st press release claiming he's a parody the actual April Fool's joke?

Inquiring minds couldn't care less.

[yawn]

PZ Myers · 1 April 2007

Oh, man, I should have known Egnor was too stupid to be true.

Do you think maybe he was selected because his name opened up a lot of very obvious jokes? Or was the name a clue, too?

We should check all those sites we used to determine that Egnor was an actual surgeon at SUNY Stony Brook. Maybe the DI also went to the trouble of constructing fake links to really sucker us in. (Nah, no one would be that elaborate, would they?)

Ric · 1 April 2007

Seriously, it is no surprise that people fell for Egnor's little joke. He sounded no different than the standard creationists, and people over at Uncommon Descent say the same things all the time.

Reed A. Cartwright · 1 April 2007

Are you saying that UD is one big April Fools' joke? That would explain a lot.

Chuck Morrison · 1 April 2007

Or is Egnor for real and the DI's April 1st press release claiming he's a parody the actual April Fool's joke?

My money's on this one. The press release says this: "Intelligent Design theorists embrace evolutionary science and its implications for modern biology and medicine. Common descent is a fine working hypothesis; natural selection can produce some limited forms of information; it would be foolish to deny these." Coming from the Discovery Institute, that's either a prank or just plain crazy.

Mike Haubrich · 1 April 2007

Am I the only one who doesn't get the joke? We are supposed to believe that he was playing dumber than he really is to pull a fast one on us; while in his confession he still holds fast to a disbelief in macro-evolution. Ha Ha.

It is possible that as a liberal I am humour-impaired, but I think that this is even less funny than the Farting Jones.

tacitus · 1 April 2007

"Street theater" indeed. Nice one.

Greg Laden · 1 April 2007

April fool to you too!

Gary Hurd · 1 April 2007

I still think they are liars, and this latest lie is an effort to look a little less stupid.

How can anyone tell the difference?

ceejayoz · 1 April 2007

So, their joke is that their arguments are so dumb they're indistinguishable from parody?

Wow. They showed us!

Greg Laden · 1 April 2007

Ceejayoz: It is not their joke! See:

http://gregladen.com/wordpress/?p=622

Jeff · 1 April 2007

Well played, panda's thumb, well played. You even had me fooled.

Russell · 1 April 2007

Or is Egnor for real and the DI's April 1st press release claiming he's a parody the actual April Fool's joke? Inquiring minds couldn't care less. [yawn]

— ben
My thoughts exactly. I'm happy to say I skipped over all the Egnore posts. Because, despite the IDists protests, there really is no border between the ridiculous and [what they seem to think is] sublime.

George · 1 April 2007

Sorry, the April fools day joke is the April fools day joke. However, Dr. Egnor is the fool either way. His rhetoric was the same as any other creationist. The only difference between he and "any" other is the expectation that he knew some science.

For me, I think he remains a creationist in denial of reality.

Richard Simons · 1 April 2007

Why does the banner change from 'Evolution Views and News' to 'Evolution News and Views' if you go from the 'coming clean' site to the main page? The URL also changes.

I'm sure that, as Greg hints, this is an April Fool joke. What I'm looking forward to now is the reaction from the real Egnor, Dembski and the rest of the gang.

Elf Eye · 1 April 2007

OK, "Guest Contributor," you got me. But I still want to know how we would tell the difference between a parody of an ID argument and an actual ID argument. You wouldn't have been able to pull this prank off if that didn't present a real difficulty.

Kent Kauffman · 1 April 2007

How would they fake this, and this?

Ron Okimoto · 1 April 2007

Actually the joke is on the ID scam artist at the Discovery Institute, and they should be embarrassed to have perpetrated what they call an obvious fraud for the simple reason that the vast majority of their true believers probably thought that it was for real. Look how long they perpetrated the ID fraud and got people to think that they had something worth teaching in the public schools. Now, the claim is that teaching ID is "premature." Yeah, and Egnorance was just a joke, so what was ID all these years if they have to admit that ID is premature today? What was ID when the Discovery Institute scam outfit was founded in 1995? Why have they been pulling that joke on their supporters for over a decade?

It is a simple fact that you can't parody a creationist, no matter how outlandish you make their arguments there is always some boob that has gone that far. I bet that everything that Egnor put up has been proposed seriously by quite a few creationists at sometime or another. My guess is that they got the material from ARN and places like AIG and didn't even have to make it up.

I wonder if Jay Richard's presentation at Knoxville was "street theater?" How can anyone tell when his ID junk is just as verifiable as his "street theater" and probably suckered the same people?

Ron Okimoto

Science Avenger · 1 April 2007

No one could tell the difference between a satire of their position and the real thing? Sounds like they missed the mark on just who was made the fool here.

richCares · 1 April 2007

it took a second or two to realize that this is not a DI joke but a Panda's Thumb joke on the DI. Was really great and a great big laugh was my response. You guys otdid yourself, Loved it. The phony URL and the "misinformation" statement at bottom of DI confession gave it away

THANKS, needed the laugh

Paul t. · 1 April 2007

Let me see if I understand this correctly? The DI trots out every ID argument ever devised to get everyone all worked up, then disavows it all as a practical joke? Stating, in effect, that they are aware that it's all bullshit.

By doing this, didn't they just deny their entire program? Talk about shooting yourself in the foot!

keiths · 1 April 2007

You guys don't give the DI enough credit. As Bill Dembski recently wrote,

Believe it or not, it really helps that the other side thinks we're such morons.

Barry · 1 April 2007

http://www.evolutionnews.org/
is the site for the DI; your link goes to
http://www.evolutionnews.net; that site gives me a 404 error.

Mike Haubrich · 1 April 2007

Now, I get it. I just have to read a little more closely next time.

Tim · 1 April 2007

Didn't the whole Egnor thing begin with his views being critiqued by a science writer at TIME magazine? For this to have been a ruse,one would have to account for how TIME was brought into the game. Either DI got really lucky, or TIME was also in on it.

Is it more likely that there was no ruse, and that Egnor decided he wanted "out" - and rather than conceding that he was wrong, or simply disappearing, this story about "street theater" was concocted?

Doug S · 1 April 2007

The cynic in me would suggest that Egnor thoroughly got his butt kicked, knows it, and is looking for a graceful exit. But that's just the cynic in me. Since when do April Fool's jokes start a month before April 1st? (or however long it's been ...)

Pierce R. Butler · 1 April 2007

Now we're supposed to believe that a real neurosurgeon and medical ethics instructor has actively participated in a weeks-long hoax that blithely jeopardized his own reputation and professional credibility?

Can anyone here think of a comparable case?

The closest parallels that I can think of are the creative flailings of Johns Kerry & McCain - but those are hardly the same, given how little dignity and respect accrue to the title of "Senator" any more: "just kidding" is only the blandest offering in the routine smorgasbord of political excuses.

Do medical-credentialing standards have anything to say about public deceptions for ideological causes?

Reed A. Cartwright · 1 April 2007

I am of course ashamed of begin caught in the DI's web of deceit. Their wit sure made a fool out of me.

And for all of you out there who seem to be upset that you've been had, get over it. The DI proved that it was better than you. Just accept it graciously.

sbandyk · 1 April 2007

I can't, for the life of me, figure out why they would do this. What were they trying to prove?
It appears they hoped to prove evolutionists (aka Darwinists) will respond knee-jerk to their postings. The proof is apparently in the correction of what they themselves characterize as blatently rediculous statements. So, they say clearly wrong things and when someone points it out, it's proof that they are credible? I'm a bit confused.

How can this be seen as anything but affirmation that it's impossible to tell the difference between the 'fake' incorrect statements and the 'real' incorrect statements.

steven.

Skeptico · 1 April 2007

Brilliant! Best April Fools prank ever. (This year, anyway.)

meatbrain · 1 April 2007

What it boils down to is that Michael Egnor is a liar. He lied about his own beliefs. IDiots will lie about anything. To wit: "Intelligent Design is not Creationism". Egnor lies again.

sbandyk · 1 April 2007

Almost forgot.

What will this say about the DI supporters who didn't get the joke either? Is there any chance that any of them will second guess their support of DI when they can't figure out the difference between approved DI content and intentional lying?
I suspect not. :-(

Tim · 1 April 2007

Okay - got it. I just didn't scroll down far enough. Good one... P.Z.?

Greg Laden · 1 April 2007

By the way, the pirate patch on the eye is brilliant. I had not noticed it but one of my readers did.

normdoering · 1 April 2007

My first instinct was that Egnor was a hoax because of the name and the arguments the DI had abandoned long ago. However, Popper's Ghost and others insisted he was real and there were the web sites that indicated the man really existed.

I don't think they were joking. I think Egnor is real and he was having a breakdown and he's now starting to come to his senses. The DI is just trying to cover their own and his ass. They don't want to own up to the fact that crazy religious belief really is a sign of mental problems.

Bronze Dog · 1 April 2007

No matter how many levels of leg-pulling you think is going on, the joke is quite funny.

And it still conveys the message that IDiocy is so astoundingly stupid, you can't parody it.

Johnny · 1 April 2007

HAH, looks like I got suckered by you guys! That was really good.

BC · 1 April 2007

Um, right. I'm supposed to believe that the Michael Egnor statements over the last two months were part of an April Fool's day joke? Seems much more likely that the April 1st claims that it was all a prank IS the April Fool's Day joke. I mean, we all know how ignorant creationist/IDist thinking can be on these topics, and Egnor does not reach parody levels of ignorance (though, admittedly, it's hard to say something so dumb that anyone - even creationists - will recognize it as a parody of creationist thought).

normdoering · 1 April 2007

Wait -- you got me. This is a Panda's Thumb joke.

http://www.evolutionnews.net/2007/04/april_fools.html#entry-070401
http://www.evolutionnews.org/

The web sites are different. The real one is .org, the fake is .net

normdoering · 1 April 2007

Wait -- you got me. This is a Panda's Thumb joke.

The web sites are different. The real one is .org, the fake is .net

Jody Wheeler · 1 April 2007

Guys, it's Panda Thumb's joke.

The registrar of "Evolutionnews.Net" ... the site this post links to, is Wes.

I was expecting to find PZs name....

Ron Okimoto · 1 April 2007

I plead nolo contendere.

Good joke, but my guess is that evolutionnews.org isn't laughing.

http://www.evolutionnews.net/2007/04/april_fools.html#entry-070401

The alteration of the standard DI disclaimer at the bottom was pretty good. A good joke has to be based on reality.

Hrafn · 1 April 2007

I had my suspicions when I couldn't find an author listed at the bottom. That plus the fact that Egnor has just posted some new stupidity:
http://www.evolutionnews.org/2007/04/what_if_darwinism_were_right.html

Bob · 1 April 2007

So basically, a parody of ID and ID itself are not different? I've seen a lot of posts on overwhelmingevidence and other such sites praising Dr. Egnor. Were all of these posts in on the joke.

A simple solution to this problem. Dr. Egnor is a real person. Someone should simply email him and ask him what his involvement ....D'oh..... oh crap I feel stupid now.

Nothing makes sense anymore!!!! I can't tell ID parody from ID itself....Thinking too much.... Brain going to explode....Must read answers in genesis to turn of thought process.

Stephen · 1 April 2007

It's a few years since I've been taken in by an April Fool, but you had me with this one. Congratulations to all concerned.

Monado · 1 April 2007

I'm linking to this! What a nice idea. I think I'll believe in it til midnight strikes: Discovery Institute, religious right, renounce 'Lying for Jesus'.

Vyoma · 1 April 2007

I'm so confused.

And I still can't tell the difference between a parody of ID and the "real" thing.

Next thing, you'll be telling us that the argument from peanut butter is a joke, too.

Please tell me it's a joke. I've heard so much dumb stuff over the years that I really can't tell if it's for real or not, and I'd like to think that people aren't so misguided as to think that new life forms should be appearing in jars of peanut butter...

Rupert Goodwins · 1 April 2007

But is this, from Egnor's latest 1st April posting, real or prank?

"I think intelligent design is true because of the science. I believe that some biological complexity --- the genetic code, the cellular nanotechnology, the astonishing integration of organs and systems --- is best understood as the consequence of intelligent agency. Those who claim that randomness can generate biological complexity seem to lack an understanding of the vastness of what statisticians call "combinatorial space." A grammatically correct, meaningful twenty-word English sentence cannot be generated by chance without an intelligently designed target that captures grammar and meaning. Did randomness generate the human beings who write English sentences? I have not seen any scientific evidence that would even suggest that it could or that it did."

I wonder if he's ever read Climbing Mount Improbable? And if he has - even if he's got reasoned objections to it - how on earth can he say that biologists have no understanding of combinatorial space?

Regardless of what one believes, it's statements like this - ones that experts in semantics categorise by the technical description "just plain wrong" - which defy even good faith attempts to get a discussion going.

R

Kristine · 1 April 2007

Uh...so the real joke (by PT! on the DI! and us!) is that Egnor actually believes what he says? Dang.

That plus the fact that Egnor has just posted some new stupidity

"Christians deal with suffering" he says. *Phhht!* I think we're the ones dealing with this painful nonsense.

Vyoma, the peanut butter theory is for real. It apparently is a variation of the potato chip theory.

sparc · 1 April 2007

Good leading Christian creationist would never post on Sundays.
And seemingly they omit reading unholy PT on Sundays. Otherwise there would have been some reaction.

PvM · 1 April 2007

Wow, for a moment.... Clever...

Susannah · 1 April 2007

You got me. For all of 30 seconds.

Then I remembered the date.

And that ideologues never, ever, ever, back-track on a claim, no matter how foolish. It might cause people to doubt their authority on other claims, don'tchaknow?

science nut · 1 April 2007

Most excellent...subtle humor expertly crafted with a delicate delivery!

Judging by all the swallowed hook, line and sinkers, the Flock of Dodos has us pegged.

Author, author!

cbutterb · 1 April 2007

Wow, the first ever meta-April Fool's Day joke! Well done, PT. Nice touch having the fake DI page link to the index page at the real one. I was fooled until I couldn't get back to the fake post.

And the eyepatch was brilliant too.

Reed A. Cartwright · 1 April 2007

"Author, author!"

It was a group effort between PT and several other blogs. I'll let other people speak for themselves, but I did the faux page (eye-patch and all), getting help from a couple other people about the language of the "admission". I used a domain that Wesley has had for a couple of years. Evolutionnews.net used to redirect to PT, but has been offline since the start of the year. That is why people are getting 404 errors. It only has a single page and is not redirecting its requests anywhere at the moment. I'll fix it in a few days.

I am really surprised that we fooled so many people. I really thought that I had made too many changes to the ENV's style and people were going to catch on quickly.

I really enjoyed watching the sly comments of people who noticed the differences commented on them, but didn't come out an ruin the prank.

Thanks, Everyone.

Nick (Matzke) · 1 April 2007

Just so everyone knows, we faked this one too. C'mon, no neurosurgeon would say stuff that silly.

burredbrain · 1 April 2007

Congrats to Wes (and any other participants). One of the best April Fools jokes I've encountered. I know I'll be giggling about it for the rest of the month.

And as someone else already noted, I can't wait to see how Luskin, Egnor, and the rest of the IDiots respond.

Phil · 1 April 2007

How could we have know better?

Ever heard of Poe's Law?

http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=Poe%27s+Law

Anton Mates · 1 April 2007

You got me too. Now we just have to decide if Egnor's most recent article is meant seriously:

Materialism is nonsense, because if matter and energy are all that exist, then truth doesn't exist (it's neither matter nor energy). If truth doesn't exist, then materialism can't be true.

— Egnor
Difficult, isn't it?

Gerry L · 1 April 2007

Outstanding. Tour de force. (i.e., some people just have way too much time). Really, this was a very clever leverage of the whole Egnor kerfluffle. Hats off to all who participated and who managed to trick even the clever PTers.
Now, how long do you think it will be before the DI will attempt to sic its lawyers on the PT for copyright infringement or libel or some other inflated indignation?

Reed A. Cartwright · 1 April 2007

We wouldn't have done it if we thought that the DI didn't have a sense of humor. I'm not sure why they'd be angry because taken literally the prank makes us look like fools and makes them look like geniuses.

John A. Michon · 1 April 2007

Even the footer (or should I say disclaimer) is part of this superb joke. Read the following aloud and very, very slowly:

"The misreporting of the evolution issue is one key reason for this site. Unfortunately, much of the news coverage has been sloppy, inaccurate, and in some cases, overtly biased. Evolution Views & News presents analysis of that coverage, as well as original reporting that accurately delivers misinformation about the current state of the debate over Darwinian evolution.Click here to read more. http://www.evolutionnews.org/>"

Science Avenger · 1 April 2007

Wow. I was wondering why when I backtracked to the main page, the article wasn't listed. The absence of an author bothered me as well.

Touche' gents. I can't wait to see their reaction.

John A. Michon · 1 April 2007

Believe it or not: Dr. Michael Egnor is real. There are all these comments that seem to indicate a degree of disbelief as to his existence (although their number does not really surprise me given his recent writings). The evidence offered by the Science Citation Index is, I bet, incontrovertible and gives such references as the following item (that has apparently been cited some 25 times since it appeared in 2002):

"Title: A model of pulsations in communicating hydrocephalus
Author(s): Egnor M, Zheng LL, Rosiello A, Gutman F, Davis R
Source: PEDIATRIC NEUROSURGERY 36 (6): 281-303 JUN 2002
Document Type: Article
Language: English
Cited References: 60 Times Cited: 25
Abstract: The traditional theory of communicating hydrocephalus has implicated the bulk flow component of CSF motion; that is, hydrocephalus is generally understood as an imbalance between CSF formation and absorption. The theory that the cause of communicating hydrocephalus is malabsorption of CSF at the arachnoid villi is not substantiated by experimental evidence or by physical reasoning. Flow-sensitive MRI has shown that nearly all CSF motion is pulsatile, and there is substantial evidence that hyperdynamic choroid plexus pulsations are necessary and sufficient for ventricular dilation in communicating hydrocephalus. We have developed a model of intracranial pulsations based on the analogy between the pulsatile motion of electrons in an electrical circuit and the pulsatile motion of blood and CSF in the cranium. Increased impedance to the flow of CSF pulsations in the subarachnoid space redistributes the flow of pulsations into the ventricular CSF and into the capillary and venous circulation. The salient features of communicating hydrocephalus, such as ventricular dilation, intracranial pressure waves, narrowing of the CSF-venous pressure gradient, diminished cerebral blood flow, elevated resistive index and malabsorption of CSF, emerge naturally from the model. We propose that communicating hydrocephalus is the result of a redistribution of CSF pulsations in the cranium. Copyright (C) 2002 S. Karger AG, Basel.
Author Keywords: hydrocephalus; cerebrospinal fluid dynamics; mathematical model; intracranial pressure waves; resistive index
KeyWords Plus: INFUSION MANOMETRIC TEST; CEREBROSPINAL-FLUID; BLOOD-FLOW; INFANTILE HYDROCEPHALUS; SUBARACHNOID HEMORRHAGE; INTRACRANIAL-PRESSURE; PULSE PRESSURE; CSF ABSORPTION; BRAIN-DAMAGE; DILATATION
Addresses: Egnor M (reprint author), SUNY Stony Brook, Dept Neurosurg, 8122, Stony Brook, NY 11794 USA
SUNY Stony Brook, Dept Neurosurg, Stony Brook, NY 11794 USA
SUNY Stony Brook, Dept Mech Engn, Stony Brook, NY 11794 USA

Publisher: KARGER, ALLSCHWILERSTRASSE 10, CH-4009 BASEL, SWITZERLAND
Subject Category: Clinical Neurology; Pediatrics; Surgery
IDS Number: 568XB

ISSN: 1016-2291"

Unless, of course Zheng LL, Rosiello A, Gutman F and Davis R conspired to create this chimaeric MD to act as their first author, but then, the abstract looks perfectly sensible to me.

Gary Hurd · 1 April 2007

Oh MAN!

I never checked!

Good one.

shiva · 1 April 2007

Evolutionnews.net; Discover Institute, and Evolution Views and News. BillyBoy is going to be mad with this parody - expect him to sanctimoniously blather as usual. As for his bootlicking brigade, they are too dense to catch the laugh - they will simply scream! science if hard work. Once in a while it is good to have a laugh at the expense of creationist kooks!

zabong · 1 April 2007

I completely egnored the eye patch at first reading.

To Panda's thumb and especially Reed Cartwright: clap clap clap clap clap...

Paul Flocken · 1 April 2007

Far, Far sweeter, would have been if Egnor had come out (a la Sokal) and claimed that weeks worth of posts had been his joke on the DI. Now that would have been a sight to see.

Sincerely,
Paul

Glen Davidson · 1 April 2007

It's a slight twist on an old joke, of course. Dembski wrote something rather like this a year or two ago, one of the few times when he seemed genuinely able to laugh at himself (to be fair, it's hard to do when everyone you want to have respect for you is laughing at you, never mind that it's his own fault).

The truth is that I looked at this several ways before deciding that my first impulse was correct, that it was indeed a joke by our guys, for it could have been a joke by them, could even be Egnor trying to redeem some of his more ridiculous claims, or it could be one of ours.

Well yes, not all that new or original, but then it's hard to parody ID as anything but a joke on the world. It seems that none who were in very deep, other than Denton, can even understand how it is a joke, really, aside from the very real consequences that they wish to impose upon the world.

And hasn't Egnor more or less been parodying himself recently? He looks at adaptation and says that's real and important to medicine, but evolution (in the meaningful scientific sense) is neither one. It's hard to think that a reasonably bright guy could fall for such a simple linguistic mistake, but there it is, he has to make some serious mistake somewhere along the line to be on their side.

Glen D
http://tinyurl.com/35s39o

mark · 1 April 2007

The folks at the Discovery Institute have, like Bill Murray in Groundhog Day, been caught in a time warp (but April 1 rather than February 2) for many, many years.
He's not a fool in any season
Who criticizes fools with reason.

(Sebastian Brant, Ship of Fools

Doc Bill · 1 April 2007

I returned from an Internet Abstentia to find that the DI had hoaxed us all. Yes, I fell for it and was all too ready to believe the Egnor was the devious twit he portrayed himself to be. Then, the double-feint, thrust and lunge! I was totally disoriented. Who hoaxed whom? Hey, it takes me a while but I figured it out. Reed wrote:

We wouldn't have done it if we thought that the DI didn't have a sense of humor. I'm not sure why they'd be angry because taken literally the prank makes us look like fools and makes them look like geniuses.

Ha, the joke is that we made ourselves look like but fools and were all too ready to congratulate the DI on humor unsuspected! The reality is, though, that tomorrow we'll wake up the geniuses we are and the DI will wake up fools.

Howard Hershey · 1 April 2007

Perhaps the first clue is that, when egnor is written backward it is the cleverly misspelled word "[w]ronge". ;-) What day is this again?

Robert Carnegie · 1 April 2007

Reed - a very nice touch where in these comments it apsears -you- are falling for it.

I may be mistaken but http://www.snopes.com/lost/false.htm seems substantially larger than before? I wonder what's their latest?

Mike · 1 April 2007

Well, the real Michael Egnor has posted an April Fools' Day message too. See http://www.evolutionnews.org/2007/04/what_if_darwinism_were_right.html#more

steve s · 1 April 2007

Mr. Egnorant says:

I suspect that is the cause for all their vitriol. Is Darwinism true? I'll believe it if I see it. Is intelligent design true? Atheists won't see it, because they won't believe it.

We can't see it, because you can't seem to publish it.

Mike Elzinga · 1 April 2007

Sheesh! I've been sick all day and didn't touch the computer until now. I missed all the fun.

My first impulse was to wonder how the parody was distinguishable from the real thing. The joke turned out to be even better than that. It should put real stress on Dembski's filter.

Great job Reed and PZ.

Kim · 1 April 2007

Really good job guys, .net versus .org......

Ian H Spedding FCD · 2 April 2007

Oh come on, people, it's the disclaimer that's the April Fool's joke. There isn't a snowball-in-hell's chance that the IDiots are going to concede any ground to evil agnostic, atheistic, materialistic, eugenicistic Darwinists. What we have is an example of how someone can be competent - even pre-eminent - in one field and a complete dunderhead in another. That a distinguished neurosurgeon could actually believe that this:
Materialism is nonsense, because if matter and energy are all that exist, then truth doesn't exist (it's neither matter nor energy). If truth doesn't exist, then materialism can't be true.
actually constitutes a logical argument is clear evidence of that. That he can tap-dance behind God's inscrutability of purpose in order to sidestep the ugly mismatch between the Christian concept of God and the world as we see it is evidence of how unoriginal his apologetics are.
I don't pretend to understand all his designs, and I have no reason to be confident that I understand any part of his design in biology. We impute randomness where we can't discern design. My ignorance of God's design in biology would look to me like randomness, and my failure to discern design in biology would not shake my faith.
I suppose we can take some comfort from the fact that Egnor does concede that there is at least the appearance of "randomness" in nature and that it is his own limitations which render him unable to recognize the design which his faith tells him must be there. Unfortunately, one of those limitations also makes him unable to construct logical arguments, and he gives further evidence of that in his final paragraph:
What if intelligent design were shown to be right, by scientific evidence? Most atheists would feel their faith in materialism greatly endangered, if not untenable.
For some reason it seems to escape Egnor that we already have unassailable scientific evidence of intelligent design - specifically our own handiwork - which, far from putting a dent in materialism, only helps to confirm it. Of course, what he is really talking about is non-human ID which must refer to some form of extra-terrestrial intelligence since the IDiots scrupulously avoid identifying the designer as God. Unfortunately for Egnor's pious hopes, though, if we did find evidence of ETID (extra-terrestrial intelligent design) anything less than God makes it just another of those damned materialistic explanations which isn't actually a problem for materialism strangely enough.

Shalini · 2 April 2007

The eyepatch was the one that did it -- even before I got around to reading the whole thing.

Christophe Thill · 2 April 2007

I don't understand. What's the point in making a parody of themselves? Why was it a trap? In my opinion, the joke's on them. They just look stupidet than ever. They're totally clueless.

Pete Dunkelberg · 2 April 2007

For anyone wondering if Dr. Egnor is real: he's listed here, which indicates he's real, but not for real. But you knew that.

John Bode · 2 April 2007

Y'all are bad, bad people.

gb · 2 April 2007

And proving once again ID has God on the brain:

"Good night and God Bless."

fbarrett · 2 April 2007

I agree with the comments that believe Egnor's claim about a hoax is a face saver or a ploy to confuse. After all, lying is their main weapon.
What Egnor admits to believing in is a minority view among IDists. If The DI adopted his views, they would be abandoning Creationism, and they would nover do that. The Biblical story the Creation is the whole point.

Gaia sighs... · 2 April 2007

Hmm. Given the shock, I'm surprised you're not searching around for the Panda's impedicus.

Seems that, if ever there was a time to be displaying it, it is now.

Popper's Ghost · 2 April 2007

I'm sorry, but anyone who actually believed that Egnor was some elaborate put-on just because this post said so is as much an idiot as any IDiot. Skepticism doesn't mean only questioning what "the other side" says. The claims in this post, and the fake (unsigned) DI piece it links to, were utterly fantastic and implausible, even without clicking on any of the links there and seeing the logo change before your eyes. A fine bunch of "scientists" you are.

Popper's Ghost · 2 April 2007

We wouldn't have done it if we thought that the DI didn't have a sense of humor. I'm not sure why they'd be angry because taken literally the prank makes us look like fools and makes them look like geniuses.

a) They don't have a sense of humor. b) The prank did make a lot of fools here look like fools. c) The prank makes Egnor and the other folks at DI look like morons, because Egnor's posts aren't "an outlandish parody of the bona fide Intelligent Design position", they're the real thing ... and really outlandish and "ridiculous". People here were momentarily foolish to gullibly accept this post and not even consider what day it was posted on (whereas Egnor's supposed parody posts, editorials, and on-line chats did not occur on April 1st), but the real Egnor, and the rest of the IDiots, are truly outlandish and ridiculous in their fundamental views and behavior, and compared to the fake Egnor are complete dunces. Making that point as well as you did ought to make them angry.

Popper's Ghost · 2 April 2007

Believe it or not: Dr. Michael Egnor is real. There are all these comments that seem to indicate a degree of disbelief as to his existence

This disbelief long predated this hoax; some particularly stupid people here suggested that Egnor wasn't real because of his name. This sort of disbelief reflects an unfortunate elitist insularity -- many people here don't have a clue just how many people like Egnor there are out there, despite the polls.

Popper's Ghost · 3 April 2007

You got me too. Now we just have to decide if Egnor's most recent article is meant seriously:

Materialism is nonsense, because if matter and energy are all that exist, then truth doesn't exist (it's neither matter nor energy). If truth doesn't exist, then materialism can't be true.

— Egnor
Difficult, isn't it?

No, it isn't difficult, because the real Egnor isn't writing parody, in that piece or any of his other pieces -- something that people inexplicably have difficulty understanding. It is only the fake Egnor piece that isn't stupid -- the real Egnor isn't capable of it. Just because he's a stupid loon doesn't mean that he doesn't expect to be taken seriously, or is writing humor.

Popper's Ghost · 3 April 2007

How could we have know better?

Because the fake Egnor post isn't what the IDiots believe, whereas the real Egnor writes stuff quite typical of IDiots. It's quite simple, really. What's disturbing is that anyone here could think that the real DI would put forward something like "Intelligent Design theorists embrace evolutionary science and its implications for modern biology and medicine. Common descent is a fine working hypothesis; natural selection can produce some limited forms of information; it would be foolish to deny these. We, as ID theorists, simply recognize one additional fact about our Universe that the Church of Darwin refuses to: when all else fails, laughter is still the best medicine." Jeez.

Popper's Ghost · 3 April 2007

Just so everyone knows, we faked this one too. C'mon, no neurosurgeon would say stuff that silly.

No doubt there are some here who believe that.

Popper's Ghost · 3 April 2007

Judging by all the swallowed hook, line and sinkers, the Flock of Dodos has us pegged.

That's unfortunately astute.

Popper's Ghost · 3 April 2007

And I still can't tell the difference between a parody of ID and the "real" thing.

Um, the parody of ID (DI) says that Egnor's posts are "outlandish parody of the bona fide Intelligent Design position, liberally injected with many of the more simplistic errors of the Young Earth Creationists" whereas the real IDiots embrace Egnor and his nonsense. People here talk about Poe's Law; are they really unable to distinguish between a parody of Egnor's nonsense, which would have been uninteresting, precisely because of Poe's Law, and pretending that the real Egnor is a parody? They're vastly different.

Popper's Ghost · 3 April 2007

My first instinct was that Egnor was a hoax because of the name and the arguments the DI had abandoned long ago. However, Popper's Ghost and others insisted he was real and there were the web sites that indicated the man really existed.

Indeed I did, and anyone who thought then, or after reading this post and it's link, that Egnor was fake or was faking his views should check in their instincts and get knew ones -- or stop depending on instincts and use facts and logic instead. Did people here actually think that all the IDiots who made complimentary and sympathetic comments about Egnor on UD and elsewhere for these months were the butts of some joke by Dembski -- that Dembski and Egnor actually set out to show what ignorant morons their sycophants are? Give me a break.

Vyoma · 3 April 2007

People here talk about Poe's Law; are they really unable to distinguish between a parody of Egnor's nonsense, which would have been uninteresting, precisely because of Poe's Law, and pretending that the real Egnor is a parody? They're vastly different.

— Popper's ghost
Actually, I didn't understand what the joke was until I checked back in this morning (been busy with a paper). I had thought the whole Egnor character had been created as a joke, not only a single entry. I'm familiar with Poe's Law. Applying it is the hard part, particularly when looking at rank-and-file ID advocates on the Internet. The assertions that Egnor makes are nothing in comparison to some that I've run across. One European true-believer, for instance, insists that the pigmentation of fungal fruiting bodies are the result of the designer's desire for self-expression, not of selective pressures. Once you've bumped into this sort of a claim, Egnor's assertions don't seem nearly as bizarre.

Parrish · 3 April 2007

Reading this article about how silly we were to think a surgeon of all people could have such a 'cockamamie' (for lack of a better word) idea of evolutionary processes makes me think of a one man... Bill Frist. He is the perfect example of a man with an advanced degree, in charge of keeping people alive on the operating table, who has quite an odd idea of the reality of disease transmission, evolutionary process, and biology in general.
Also, (and I really do not intend any offense to anyone out there... but), we must remember that a physician is not actually an intellectually trained scientist. Medical school is a trade school, just like any other. Yes, physicians need to be very skilled at their job, as people's lives are at risk, but that is about all. As much as medical school trains one to be excellent at anatomy and diagnostics, it does not emphasize the intricacies and abstract ideas of science.
Parrishsd

Popper's Ghost · 4 April 2007

Once you've bumped into this sort of a claim, Egnor's assertions don't seem nearly as bizarre.

And yet there are people who do find them bizarre -- so bizarre that they are ready to believe that Egnor was only pretending to hold the views he professed, despite that being utterly implausible. These people -- so many people here -- seem to have virtually no understanding of the scope and variety of counter-evolutionary beliefs. What sorts of lives do these people lead, that they can be so clueless about the society they live in?

Anton Mates · 4 April 2007

You got me too. Now we just have to decide if Egnor's most recent article is meant seriously:Materialism is nonsense, because if matter and energy are all that exist, then truth doesn't exist (it's neither matter nor energy). If truth doesn't exist, then materialism can't be true.

— Popper's Ghost
Difficult, isn't it?

No, it isn't difficult, because the real Egnor isn't writing parody, in that piece or any of his other pieces --- something that people inexplicably have difficulty understanding. It is only the fake Egnor piece that isn't stupid --- the real Egnor isn't capable of it. Just because he's a stupid loon doesn't mean that he doesn't expect to be taken seriously, or is writing humor. Yes, I know. I was joking about that part. What I found believable, at least until about 3/4 of the way down the faux Egnor piece, is that he would claim something he'd said previously was a joke. When I first saw the PT post, I figured he'd made a "street theater" comment like Dembski had, and PT was simply making fun of it.

Levi · 4 April 2007

uh words......words....hatred....words....so defensive......insults, and yet a chimp is still a chimp and evolutionists still claim origin of life doesn't apply and you still can't decide if homolgy is proof of common ancestry or not. what happened to your consensus?

Science Avenger · 4 April 2007

Levi asked: a chimp is still a chimp
And green is still green, every little step of the way along the light spectrum. But keep taking enough of those steps, and you have purple. Your inability to grasp such small steps does not make them unable to travel such distances.
evolutionists still claim origin of life doesn't apply
It doesn't, it's a different subject. Evolution is akin to the theory that a falling domino is capable of knocking over the domino in front of it, and thus once one domino is falling, my Falling Domino Theory explains the sequence of fallen dominos. This is a completely different question than the one of what toppled the first domino. The Falling Domino Theory is valid regardless of whether the First Domino Theory finds that the cause was intelligent (a god) or materialistic (a strong wind). It just doesn't matter.
and you still can't decide if homolgy [sic] is proof of common ancestry or not. what happened to your consensus?
The consensus is that creationism/ID is intellectually dishonest crap. There will always be disputes between scientists on the details of the legitimate science. Growth is its power, and stagnation is creationism's weakness. Science changes, pseudoscience changes names.

Reed A. Cartwright · 5 April 2007

Prank is over. Comments closed.