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Josh at work Joshua Rosenau spends his days defending the teaching of evolution at the National Center for Science Education. He is formerly a doctoral candidate at the University of Kansas, in the department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology. When not battling creationists or modeling species ranges, he writes about developments in progressive politics and the sciences.

The opinions expressed here are his own, do not reflect the official position of the NCSE. Indeed, older posts may no longer reflect his own official position.

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    « Deep thought on Shakespeare and tax policy | Main | TfK is moving: We need a new name »

    IDolators don't understand science

    Category: Culture Wars
    Posted on: July 24, 2007 10:38 AM, by Josh Rosenau

    The Discovery Institute promotes a podcast in a post titled:

    William Dembski Addresses Forthcoming Intelligent Design Research that Advances ID and Answers Critics
    How lovely to know before it happens not only that this "research" will yield answers for his critics, but that those answers will advance his own particular beliefs. Watch him move in one paragraph from "It’s too early to tell what the impact of my ideas is on science" to "I think ID is finally in a position to challenge certain fundamental assumptions in the natural sciences about the nature and origin of information. This, I believe, will have a large impact on science." Unless, of course, the research continues to be as unsuccessful as it's been thus far.

    Meanwhile, the DI's Casey Luskin acknowledges that ID is creationism, and creationist brane serjun Michael Egnor claims that it is a "bad denouement" if "natural selection is true regardless of the substrate on which it acts," claiming that this observation "impl[ies] that natural selection is a tautology." I'm not sure why it would be a bad result to show that something is true, but I'm afraid that gravity must also be a tautology. Bad denouement.

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    Comments

    1

    Speaking of ID "research," whatever happened to that "Biological Institute" where ID scientists were supposed to be doing some?

    Posted by: Mousie Cat | July 24, 2007 11:29 AM

    2

    Mousie--I noted somewhere else that Behe, in mentioning that ID research might soon conquer drug resistance in bacteria, leaked a hint of what that research might be all about--The Power of Poof! The intrepid researchers are trying to learn how to become Poof Masters to overcome sickness, evolution, and rational thought.

    Posted by: mark | July 25, 2007 12:00 PM

    3

    Dembski:

    It's too early to tell what the impact of my ideas is on science.

    Translation:
    I've been peddling this stuff for over a decade now and there still isn't a single scientist, or anyone else for that matter, who uses it.

    Posted by: secondclass | July 25, 2007 12:25 PM

    4

    Ah, you have been so nice to point out the elephant in the living room. No original scientific research. And as Howard van Till points out, the DI can't even formulate decent models about evolutionary theory.

    Posted by: James Kidder | July 30, 2007 1:10 PM

    5

    If you look at the whole quote, the interviewer is going oon about how ID has changed the world, right before Dembski hoses him down with the "too early to tell" line.

    In the same series of interviews, Behe rubbishes pro-ID alternatives to common descent.

    What's most whacko is how much of a fantasyland the pro-ID crowd live in...

    Posted by: PTET | January 25, 2008 1:32 PM

    6

    Oops - didn't see the date on the original post. Dembski just gave an interview with a similar line about "too early to tell". Trippy.

    Posted by: PTET | January 25, 2008 1:37 PM

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