Rob Crowther over at the Discovery Institute seems to be a little upset and is accusing evolutionists of arrogance. Commenting on this post by Steve Reuland over at the Panda's Thumb, Crowther opines:
You seldom see this kind of arrogance outside of academia. And you would never see scientists making such proclamations to the general public. Or to doctors. Not if they didn't want it noted on their permanent record.
The bottom line for Reuland and other dogmatic Darwinists is that scientists are Darwinists because they're smarter than you. And biologists are more likely to be Darwinists because they're even smarter than other scientists. [emphasis mine]
And what set Crowther off? This statement by Steve:
It is true of course that doctors are more prone to being creationists than scientists in general and biologists in particular. This is to be fully expected, as it's unlikely that you're going to find any one group of people who are more convinced about evolution than biologists and other scientists. But the fact is, we see a steady increase in the acceptance of evolution when we move from the uneducated to the educated, and from those whose educations are irrelevant to evolution towards those who are more relevant. [emphasis mine]
Note what's going on here. Steve is talking about "education" while Crowther is wickering on about "smart" (i.e. intelligence). We all know that education and intelligence are not synonymous, but Crowther is deliberately conflating the two to make it look like Steve is calling non-scientists dumb. Wow.
The problem for Crowther and the DI is that polls have consistently shown that acceptance of evolution increases with education (not necessarily with intelligence, however that may be quantified). Witness, for example, this poll that PZ blogged yesterday:
Acceptance of evolution increases with education, and no amount of obfuscation and lying from the Discovery Institute can alter that observation.
Comments
Arrogant, arrogant facts.
Posted by: pough | January 12, 2007 8:15 PM
Acceptance of evolution increases with education, and no amount of obfuscation and lying from the Discovery Institute can alter that observation.
I'm surprised that after years of fighting against the Disco Doods, you're willing to make such a statement. The Disco Doods can alter any observation they want, in their world at least (which can be expanded through a judicious use of PR tactics). ;)
Posted by: Tyler DiPietro | January 12, 2007 9:24 PM
Is this another example of what Colbert was talking about when he said reality had a liberal bias?
Posted by: arensb | January 14, 2007 6:16 PM