Bad Astronomy has a rant up on Tony Snow (the new White House Press Secretary) and his creationist tendencies. I won't linger on the political implications of having an anti-science advocates in our government, but one quote from Snow is so ridiculous it needs to be pointed out:
These little insights give us the basis for admitting both views into the educational system. Evolutionary theory, like ID, isn't verifiable or testable. It's pure hypothesis -- like ID -- although very popular in the scientific community. Its limits help illuminate the fact that hypotheses are only as durable as the evidence that supports them.
First Snow claims that evolution is not testable, and then he claims it is merely a popular hypothesis. In the scientific parlance, a hypothesis must be testable. If it is not testable, it is not a hypothesis. If Snow believes that evolution is not even testable, then what does that make it?
Regardless of what Snow believes evolution is more than a hypothesis. Evolution has been tested: common descent has been shown using morphological and molecular data; natural selection has been detected in natural populations and replicated in laboratories; populations have evolved in the short time we have observed them; and the fossil record provides an incredible representation of evolution. We are way beyond hypothesis here -- evolution is theory.
For ID to get anywhere close to evolution it needs to present some testable hypotheses. As Phil points out, ID is nothing more than anti-evolution. It's a negative argument. It contributes nothing of substance, only attempting to negate the mountains of evidence against it.
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As my patron saint Stephen Colbert referred to him at the White House Correspondents Dinner, get ready for a Snow Job.
The second part of the Peter Principle: A person will appoint to his administration only those who are no more competent than himself.