More cargo-cult "science" from the Centre for Intelligent Design

This week I received another email from the Centre for Intelligent Design, promoting its July Summer School. I know it's early days yet, but is the CID having trouble filling the 50 places at the event? The price has halved since it was announced, and various reduced deals have been added. At this rate people will be signing up just for the break and skipping all the talks. (According to the CID website there are some interesting local landmarks to explore.)

The email contains the following:

It's become a mantra for Darwinists to claim that ID isn't science. That's used as a put-down from the start as a device to ignore the gathering weight of empirical evidence that challenges Darwinism.

This epitomises the wrong-headedness of the ID crowd. To suggest that by claiming ID is not science one is ignoring "...the gathering weight of empirical evidence that challenges Darwinism" is a bizarre non sequitur. Whether or not empirical evidence challenging Darwinism is being ignored is neither here nor there in relation to intelligent design. It has no bearing on the scientific validity of ID. The quoted sentences are equivalent to saying:

"It's become a mantra for lawyers to claim that this woman is guilty of a crime. That's used as a put-down from the start as a device to ignore the gathering weight of empirical evidence that her neighbours watch Sky Sports on a Saturday."

It's ironic that they're accusing "Darwinists" of what they themselves are doing in these very sentences, but I'd be surprised if the CID isn't aware of this obvious logical fallacy. Perhaps they're using it as a smokescreen in a deliberate attempt to conceal the fact that ID is indeed not science. If they continue with such obfuscation they cannot expect to be taken seriously by those who value actual science above the cargo-cult version they espouse.

My 400th blogpost

It's Friday the Thirteenth, a highly significant date.

(Actually it isn't. Friday. Or significant. Sharp-eyed readers of Notes from an Evil Burnee who look for my posts every day — do I have any of those? — may have noticed that the posting date accompanying each blogpost isn't necessarily the date it's actually posted. When I'm busy with other things I can't always post on my intended daily schedule, so I catch up later and back-date posts where necessary. And this was the week of the massive Blogger outage, so even if I'd had time I wouldn't have been able to post anyway.)

Friday the Thirteenth is not significant, other than it's the date when superstitious people believe that they are more likely to experience bad luck. Which is probably a self-fulfilling prophecy, so maybe they're right after all. (I read a Hansard report the other day — David Tredinnick claiming that surgeons won't operate when there's a full moon, because blood won't clot properly. It seems like he really believes this nonsense — but he also believes homeopathy works, and wants more research to prove it. Horse, please follow the cart.)

With this (rather self-indulgent) post — my 400th — I'm up to date again. It's been five four and a half months* of daily blogging, and I continue to enjoy it, to find it a useful outlet and a means of clarifying my thoughts on a range of concerns. So, for now, I think I'll keep doing it.

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*Self-indulgent and innumerate.

Burnee links for Thursday

Christopher Hitchens: Unspoken Truths | Culture | Vanity Fair
It is an honour to read this towering intellect persisting in its failing frame. Hitch does his readers a unique service with unstinting insights into his ongoing condition. Lessons for us all.

Why the world might end next Saturday - Religion - Salon.com
An attempt to explain how nutcase Harold Camping has worked out that the "rapture" will occur on May 21st. What I want to know is this: if the date of the rapture is somehow encoded in the Bible, won't God be pretty pissed off with Camping for letting the cat out of the bag, so to speak?

Science explains the end of the world - On Faith - The Washington Post
Richard Dawkins was asked to comment on the lunacy of Harold Camping. He gives it the attention it deserves, dismissing it with utter contempt, and goes on to talk of other things. Would that the media in general took so sane a view of the matter.

Tessera: Good Girls Don't
It's hard to believe that stupid (and sexist) ideas like this one put forward by Nadine Dorries can get any traction in today's Britain, but she won the vote. Tessera gives a good analysis.

A telling telic misapprehension in Dembski & Licona's Evidence for God

The title of chapter 14 of Dembski & Licona's Evidence for God makes me wonder about the currency of it: "Debunking the Scopes 'Monkey Trial' Stereotype". The Scopes "monkey trial" was way back in 1926. It was dramatised in the black and white film Inherit the Wind. (A more recent BBC Radio drama — based on court transcripts — is available for download from RapidShare.)

The thrust of Edward Sisson's essay is that it's wrong to insist that the scientific consensus about evolution be taught to children, because in 1926 scientific consensus included the existence of the ether and the usefulness of eugenics. But if there's little actual controversy about a theory such as the ether (as there wasn't until science showed that the theory was false — indeed numerous experiments around the time of the trial were already spreading doubts about the ether's existence), how else should we determine what's to be taught in schools? Certainly not by reference to scripture — especially in the US where the teaching of religion is unconstitutional. Where there is genuine controversy it's legitimate to expose children to competing theories, but school science lessons should teach accepted science. The overwhelming scientific consensus, in 1926 as now, is that Darwinian evolution explains the way life came to be the way it is on this planet. Darwinian evolution, therefore, is what should be taught in schools.

But be that as it may, this chapter appears to be an unsubstantiated bleat for creationism, while at the same time offering no evidence for God, which is what Dembski & Licona's book is supposed to be about.

Towards the end of his chapter, Sisson clearly illustrates the usual creationist misunderstanding of evolution:

Indeed, Darwinians, who claim that all of life is motivated by an irresistible drive for survival, which necessarily means a drive for power, are poorly positioned to claim a special exemption from the very force they say rules life. (pp. 79-80)

Note the use of motivated, irresistible drive, drive for power, and force. These words impute intention — a telic force — when in fact Darwinian natural selection is nothing of the kind. There is no force, no drive, no motivation. It just happens. It's simply the way things occur in a system comprised of organisms capable of reproducing themselves, while at the same time being susceptible to reproduction errors that make them more or less suited to their environment. Darwinian evolution occurs that way because it can do no other.

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4truth.net:
http://www.4truth.net/fourtruthpbscience.aspx?pageid=8589952915

Alan Moore at TAM London 2010

I'm not a fan of comic books. Not that I have anything against graphic novels as such — it's just that I never really got into them. I've read Watchmen, seen the film, and enjoyed both, despite a certain ambivalence towards the superhero genre. I also have a couple of Neil Gaiman's Sandman series which I've yet to get to.

I didn't know what to expect of Alan Moore, though I was aware he is revered by many. I have to admit that the twenty-minute poem he proceeded to read to us on Sunday afternoon at TAM London 2010 left me cold. Maybe if I'd been more attuned to his oeuvre, or even his voice, I would have got something out of it. (I should point out that for me poetry in general is a bit of a blind spot, so I'm not qualified to assess its worth, and my comments in this regard are probably worthless.)




After the poem we were back to the discussion format, with Alan Moore in conversation with Neil Denny and Josie Long. My overall impression was of an expectation that the audience would be at least partially familiar with the subjects discussed, which I was not.

But you win some, you lose some. I know that there were people attending TAM London for whom Alan Moore's appearance was the highlight of the weekend. Alas, I'm not one of them.

The 2010 TAM London was a different animal from its predecessor. I've already mentioned the preponderance of discussion panels — a format that's fine in moderation (excuse the pun), but I would have preferred fewer of them and more of the structured talk format. I also noticed a shift towards an atheistic emphasis. This isn't something I'm against, because it fits with my own skepticism, of which my atheism is merely a subset. I suspect, however, that there will be some who feel that skepticism should not necessarily imply or assume atheism.

On the whole TAM London 2010 was highly successful and I'm glad I went. I look forward to the DVDs and to the announcement of the speaker line-up for TAM London 2011. And I'll finish with a couple of shots of the man himself wrapping up the weekend:

New episode of Skepticule Extra available

Episode 4 of Skepticule Extra, the podcast where my two co-hosts and I rant and ramble about generally skeptical and godless matters in the news and elsewhere, is now available for download. This time we go on about homeopathy, faith-healing, post-mortem conversion and books we have and haven't been reading.

Find it here:
http://www.skepticule.co.uk/2011/05/skepextra-004-20110501.html

Burnee links for Sunday

What your teachers are doing : Pharyngula
I'm reminded of the current obsession in the UK with CRB reports — if you merely enter a school building you're supposed to pay to have the Criminal Records Bureau look up your file so you can prove you're not a paedophile. Whatever happened to "innocent until proven guilty"?

The new atheist response to being told to quiet down - Butterflies and Wheels
Ophelia Benson clarifies her Gnu Atheist status.

Why I simply cannot get through Sam Harris’s new book « Choice in Dying
The Moral Landscape continues to confound serious thinkers.

Greta Christina's Blog: A Crisis of Faithlessness
What matters? Greta Christina does what in other circumstances would be called some soul-searching.