Intelligent Design Book Meets Obstacle After Proponents of Evolution Complain

[Jason Spaceman]

From the article:
----------------------------------------------------------------
The publisher of an intelligent design book has decided to put
publication plans for the book on hold after some scientists
complained that such challenges to evolution theories should not be
presented in an academic publication.

International science publisher Springer had set the publication date
for Biological Information: New Perspectives for March 31. The
publishing house apparently began hearing complaints, though, after
Nick Matzke posted a Feb. 27 article titled, "Springer gets suckered
by creationist pseudoscience" on Panda's Thumb, a blog "critical of
the antievolution movement."
------------------------------------------------------------------

Read it at http://www.christianpost.com/news/intelligent-design-book-meets-obstacle-after-proponents-of-evolution-complain-70682/
or http://tinyurl.com/6r5ro63



J. Spaceman

[pnyikos]

On Mar 2, 4:35 pm, Jason Spaceman <jspace...@linuxquestions.net>
wrote:

> From the article:
> ----------------------------------------------------------------
> The publisher of an intelligent design book has decided to put
> publication plans for the book on hold after some scientists
> complained that such challenges to evolution theories should not be
> presented in an academic publication.
>
> International science publisher Springer had set the publication date
> for Biological Information: New Perspectives for March 31. The
> publishing house apparently began hearing complaints, though, after
> Nick Matzke posted a Feb. 27 article titled, "Springer gets suckered
> by creationist pseudoscience" on Panda's Thumb, a blog "critical of
> the antievolution movement."
> ------------------------------------------------------------------
>

> Read it athttp://www.christianpost.com/news/intelligent-design-book-meets-obsta...
> orhttp://tinyurl.com/6r5ro63
>
> J. Spaceman

The following excerpt is a lot more revealing than all the hooha:

_____________________________________________
A representative from Springer told Kaustuv Basu, a reporter for
Inside Higher Ed, that the company had decided to submit the
manuscript for additional peer review.

None of the critics have read the book. Their criticism is based upon
their knowledge of the authors and their ideas.
====================================

And who *are* the authors, you ask? Dunno. The article does not
reveal their names. All you learn about is that one of the editors is
"John Sanford, one of the books editors and a semi-retired professor
at Cornell University's Department of Horticulture" but you aren't
told whether he is one of the authors of some article in there as
well. It also says:

___________________
Douglas Theobald, assistant professor of biochemistry at Brandeis
University, said he believed that "Springer has been duped and that
the senior editors are unaware that this is a quack group of anti-
evolution creationists."
=============================

I wonder whether he knows the names of the authors.

Peter Nyikos
Professor, Dept. of Mathematics -- standard disclaimer--
University of South Carolina
http://www.math.sc.edu/~nyikos/
nyikos @ math.sc.edu

[John Harshman]

I'm always amazed at how skeptical you are of anything said by any
critic of creationists, as long as there's the least little ID beard
provided. A little digging would have found you quite a bit more
information. These are the proceedings of an invitation-only creationist
conference. Sanford has written a book arguing that all species are in a
downward genetic spiral, and so the world must be only 6000 years old.
Is there any major doubt as to what kind of book he would be editing?
Hint: the subject isn't horticulture. Some but not all of the authors
are known.

[pnyikos]

You are a critic of creationists.

++++++++++++++++++++ saracsm on

Are you always amazed at how skeptical I am of anything said by you?

++++++++++++++++++++ saracsm off

In case anyone missed the point of the sarcasm: I am often grateful
for information John posts on paleontology. He just misspoke up
there.

>as long as there's the least little ID beard
> provided.

What least little ID beard? So far, what I've seen is the least
little creationist beard (Sandford's), despite an enormous amount of
smoke on the Panda's Thumb blog.

http://pandasthumb.org/archives/2012/02/springer-gets-s.html#comment-panels

> A little digging would have found you quite a bit more
> information.

Looks like I did a little more digging than you did, because I found
the names of the other editors on that Panda's Thumb blog:

Marks II, R.J.; Behe, M.J.; Dembski, W.A.; Gordon, B.L.;

I know the middle two aren't creationists in the usual t.o. senses;
what about the other two?

>These are the proceedings of an invitation-only creationist
> conference.

Reference? or are you like John Stockwell, using "creationist" as an
umbrella to encompass all nationally famous ID proponents?

I say "nationally famous" because you certainly don't think of me as a
creationist, despite my opinion that life on earth is the result of
seeding by panspermists who probably did extensive ID on the
prokaryotes (and possibly primitive eukaryotes) that they sent.

>Sanford has written a book arguing that all species are in a
> downward genetic spiral, and so the world must be only 6000 years old.

That 6000 figure is you editorializing, just like Elizabeth Liddle did
with her 10,000 figure. I linked to another blog using something she
wrote on that Panda's Thumb site, and I read a good bit of back-and-
forth between her and "Mung" and it seems she was just estimating from
a prediction by Sanford of humanity's future:
http://www.uncommondescent.com/evolution/new-paper-using-the-avida-evolution-software-shows/#comment-383856

By the way, Sanford posted their correspondence in his blog at her
request, and she thanked him for it. See message number 59.

> Is there any major doubt as to what kind of book he would be editing?
> Hint: the subject isn't horticulture. Some but not all of the authors
> are known.

But you don't know the identity of a single one, eh? Neither do I,
although I thought the Panda's Thumb people would know.

Peter Nyikos

[Ron O]

> http://pandasthumb.org/archives/2012/02/springer-gets-s.html#comment-...

>
> > A little digging would have found you quite a bit more
> > information.
>
> Looks like I did a little more digging than you did, because I found
> the names of the other editors on that Panda's Thumb blog:
>
> Marks II, R.J.; Behe, M.J.; Dembski, W.A.; Gordon, B.L.;
>
> I know the middle two aren't creationists in the usual t.o. senses;
> what about the other two?

What does denial get you? Hairsplitting prevarication just isn't
anything to base a conclusion on. Both Dembski and Behe have admitted
to being creationists. They both admit that their intelligent
designer/creator is the Biblical god. Do you deny that? My guess is
that all the editors are creationists, though I haven't seen anywhere
that they admit to it. Marks is a well known IDiot and associate of
Dembski, but I am not aware that he has admitted to being a
creationist. I do not know of Gordon. Using the fundy definition of
creationist is only a dishonest dodge at this point. Guys like Behe
and Dembski are not ID perps because of the science. If they were,
they would have some ID science, rught? Where is the ID science? Are
you going to flip flop on that issue again? Remember that currently
you are the one claiming that you no longer support the ID science.

Ron Okimoto

>
> >These are the proceedings of an invitation-only creationist
> > conference.
>
> Reference?  or are you like John Stockwell, using "creationist" as an
> umbrella to encompass all nationally famous ID proponents?
>
> I say "nationally famous" because you certainly don't think of me as a
> creationist, despite my opinion that life on earth is the result of
> seeding by panspermists who probably did extensive ID on the
> prokaryotes (and possibly primitive eukaryotes) that they sent.
>
> >Sanford has written a book arguing that all species are in a
> > downward genetic spiral, and so the world must be only 6000 years old.
>
> That 6000 figure is you editorializing, just like Elizabeth Liddle did
> with her 10,000 figure.  I linked to another blog using something she
> wrote on that Panda's Thumb site, and I read a good bit of back-and-
> forth between her and "Mung" and it seems she was just estimating from

> a prediction by Sanford of humanity's future:http://www.uncommondescent.com/evolution/new-paper-using-the-avida-ev...

[Robert Carnegie: Fnord: cc talk-origins@moderators.isc.org]

On Saturday, March 3, 2012 12:27:49 PM UTC, Ron O wrote:
> What does denial get you? Hairsplitting prevarication just isn't
> anything to base a conclusion on. Both Dembski and Behe have admitted
> to being creationists. They both admit that their intelligent
> designer/creator is the Biblical god. Do you deny that? My guess is
> that all the editors are creationists, though I haven't seen anywhere
> that they admit to it.

Technically "intelligent design" doesn't require creationism - as you acknowledge.

"What is Creationism?" (Mark Isaak, 2000, 2002)
<http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/wic.html>
describes points of view that are, may be, and
emphatically aren't "Creationism". By the way, Charles Johnson is dead and so is Flat-earthism, but he wasn't dead in 2000.

<http://www.bbc.co.uk/religion/religions/christianity/beliefs/creationism_1.shtml>
also goes into it.

I hold that for a belief to be creationism, it must say that all "kinds" of life large enough to be seen with the naked eye - or, to be specific, human beings - exist corporeally because they or their prototype population were created in the past by a process different from normal biological reproduction. So if you believe that God made the four-footed Cretaceous walking cuckoo by telling the two-footed Cretaceous walking cuckoo to grow two extra legs, that isn't "creationism". It isn't right either, in my opinion. And you could still be a Creationist just for humans.

"Microevolution" is allowed in creationism, "macroevolution" isn't; "macroevolution" is where a new "kind" arises by descent from a pre-existing kind, such as if God decided that from now on snakes shouldn't have legs... whoops. Actually, I don't believe the story, but I also think it doesn't necessarily mean that God made snakes' legs fall off, only that he was insulting a disabled creature. But in the circumstance it's arguably excusable.

And of course "intelligent design" was invented to be "the part of creationism that contradicts the theory of evolution, but without being overtly religious and therefore excluded from public-funded schools in the U.S."

It's therefore very important to ID that at least some of its advocates do not publicly embrace creationism. This is why I've said that intelligent design is for lying thieving cowards who deny their god. Well, I think I didn't originally say "thieving". But I assume you see where it fits in.

[Mark Buchanan]

On Mar 2, 4:35 pm, Jason Spaceman <jspace...@linuxquestions.net>
wrote:

> From the article:
> ----------------------------------------------------------------
> The publisher of an intelligent design book has decided to put
> publication plans for the book on hold after some scientists
> complained that such challenges to evolution theories should not be
> presented in an academic publication.
>
> International science publisher Springer had set the publication date
> for Biological Information: New Perspectives for March 31. The
> publishing house apparently began hearing complaints, though, after
> Nick Matzke posted a Feb. 27 article titled, "Springer gets suckered
> by creationist pseudoscience" on Panda's Thumb, a blog "critical of
> the antievolution movement."
> ------------------------------------------------------------------
>

> Read it athttp://www.christianpost.com/news/intelligent-design-book-meets-obsta...
> orhttp://tinyurl.com/6r5ro63
>
> J. Spaceman

For the NCSE take on it:

http://ncse.com/news/2012/03/second-thoughts-from-springer-007234

And for those who want to do some more digging:

http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2012/03/01/book-intelligent-design-proponents-upsets-scientists

http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/kansas/kangaroo4.html#p1705

Mark

[Ron O]

On Mar 3, 7:44 am, "Robert Carnegie: Fnord: cc talk-

orig...@moderators.isc.org" <rja.carne...@excite.com> wrote:
> On Saturday, March 3, 2012 12:27:49 PM UTC, Ron O wrote:
> > What does denial get you?  Hairsplitting prevarication just isn't
> > anything to base a conclusion on.  Both Dembski and Behe have admitted
> > to being creationists.  They both admit that their intelligent
> > designer/creator is the Biblical god.  Do you deny that?  My guess is
> > that all the editors are creationists, though I haven't seen anywhere
> > that they admit to it.
>
> Technically "intelligent design" doesn't require creationism - as you acknowledge.
>
> "What is Creationism?" (Mark Isaak, 2000, 2002)
> <http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/wic.html>
> describes points of view that are, may be, and
> emphatically aren't "Creationism".  By the way, Charles Johnson is dead and so is Flat-earthism, but he wasn't dead in 2000.
>

> <http://www.bbc.co.uk/religion/religions/christianity/beliefs/creation...>

> also goes into it.
>
> I hold that for a belief to be creationism, it must say that all "kinds" of life large enough to be seen with the naked eye - or, to be specific, human beings - exist corporeally because they or their prototype population were created in the past by a process different from normal biological reproduction.  So if you believe that God made the four-footed Cretaceous walking cuckoo by telling the two-footed Cretaceous walking cuckoo to grow two extra legs, that isn't "creationism".  It isn't right either, in my opinion.  And you could still be a Creationist just for humans.
>
> "Microevolution" is allowed in creationism, "macroevolution" isn't; "macroevolution" is where a new "kind" arises by descent from a pre-existing kind, such as if God decided that from now on snakes shouldn't have legs... whoops.  Actually, I don't believe the story, but I also think it doesn't necessarily mean that God made snakes' legs fall off, only that he was insulting a disabled creature.  But in the circumstance it's arguably excusable.
>
> And of course "intelligent design" was invented to be "the part of creationism that contradicts the theory of evolution, but without being overtly religious and therefore excluded from public-funded schools in the U.S."
>
> It's therefore very important to ID that at least some of its advocates do not publicly embrace creationism.  This is why I've said that intelligent design is for lying thieving cowards who deny their god.  Well, I think I didn't originally say "thieving".  But I assume you see where it fits in.

You posted the usual TO definition when just about all we had to
contend with were YEC creationists. As you indicate the ID perps use
this definition to make bogus denials about what they are and why they
are doing it. You have to look at why Nyikos is making his stupid
denial.

I do not deny the usual definiton. I just claim that it is outdated
and has not kept up with reality. The major creationist efforts in
the last 10 years has been to lie about being creationists in any way
that they think that they can get away with. Even the fundy YEC
creationists at the Discovery Institute claim that ID is not
creationism. Who should believe that when all the proponents that I
know of believe in some type of creator god? So I just use the
standard definition of creationist that anyone can look up because
that is the definition that matters in terms of what the ID perps are
doing and why they are doing it.

My definition is the standard definition. If you believe in a creator
you are a creationist. There are a lot of creationist and they range
from fundy types to guys that just believe that God created your
immortal soul or just got the universe going. Just because there are
a lot of different types of creationists does not make them any less
creationists.

Ron Okimoto

[Ernest Major]

In message
<02b480a3-27c4-451c...@t16g2000yqt.googlegroups.com>, Ron
O <roki...@cox.net> writes

I'm confused. http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/wic.html covers a wide
variety of creationist positions - not just YEC.

>
>I do not deny the usual definiton. I just claim that it is outdated
>and has not kept up with reality. The major creationist efforts in
>the last 10 years has been to lie about being creationists in any way
>that they think that they can get away with. Even the fundy YEC
>creationists at the Discovery Institute claim that ID is not
>creationism. Who should believe that when all the proponents that I
>know of believe in some type of creator god? So I just use the
>standard definition of creationist that anyone can look up because
>that is the definition that matters in terms of what the ID perps are
>doing and why they are doing it.
>
>My definition is the standard definition. If you believe in a creator
>you are a creationist. There are a lot of creationist and they range
>from fundy types to guys that just believe that God created your
>immortal soul or just got the universe going. Just because there are
>a lot of different types of creationists does not make them any less
>creationists.

Your definition is wider than common usage (and not useful).

To assert that belief in a creator is all that is necessary to be a
creationist is to commit the etymological fallacy. In common usage
creationism entails some religiously motivated rejection of scientific
consensus knowledge.
--
alias Ernest Major

[John Harshman]

And, oddly enough, so are you. But you seem quite credulous of anything
that is given the ID label instead of the creationist label.

> ++++++++++++++++++++ saracsm on
>
> Are you always amazed at how skeptical I am of anything said by you?

Not always.

> ++++++++++++++++++++ saracsm off
>
> In case anyone missed the point of the sarcasm: I am often grateful
> for information John posts on paleontology. He just misspoke up
> there.

Only if you're a mathematician and think that a single counterexample
disproves a theorem. It isn't paleontology we're talking about here.
It's the ID industry. And you are quite sceptical of almost all I say
about that.

>> as long as there's the least little ID beard
>> provided.
>
> What least little ID beard? So far, what I've seen is the least
> little creationist beard (Sandford's), despite an enormous amount of
> smoke on the Panda's Thumb blog.

Perhaps you are unacquainted with the term "beard" as used here? Most ID
is creationism, lightly disguised. The presence of Sanford is the
non-beard part.

> http://pandasthumb.org/archives/2012/02/springer-gets-s.html#comment-panels
>
>> A little digging would have found you quite a bit more
>> information.
>
> Looks like I did a little more digging than you did,

What makes you think I didn't?

> because I found
> the names of the other editors on that Panda's Thumb blog:
>
> Marks II, R.J.; Behe, M.J.; Dembski, W.A.; Gordon, B.L.;
>
> I know the middle two aren't creationists in the usual t.o. senses;
> what about the other two?

Who says Dembski isn't a creationist? He accepts a recent, worldwide
flood. He appears to doubt that humans are related to other apes. He
believes in a literal Adam and Eve. Marks is a creationist. I don't know
Gordon.

>> These are the proceedings of an invitation-only creationist
>> conference.
>
> Reference? or are you like John Stockwell, using "creationist" as an
> umbrella to encompass all nationally famous ID proponents?

No. But Behe is the only major ID proponent who actually accepts common
descent, and even he has been coy on occasion.

> I say "nationally famous" because you certainly don't think of me as a
> creationist, despite my opinion that life on earth is the result of
> seeding by panspermists who probably did extensive ID on the
> prokaryotes (and possibly primitive eukaryotes) that they sent.

That's your opinion? I thought it was your tentative hypothesis. Are you
actually now saying you think it's true? On what basis? I wouldn't call
that creationism. But of course none of the prominent IDers would agree
with any of that, unless they're entertaining the notion as a public
display of agnosticism before a non-Christian audience. They all, even
Behe, know who the designer is, and it isn't the Golgafrinchans.

>> Sanford has written a book arguing that all species are in a
>> downward genetic spiral, and so the world must be only 6000 years old.
>
> That 6000 figure is you editorializing, just like Elizabeth Liddle did
> with her 10,000 figure. I linked to another blog using something she
> wrote on that Panda's Thumb site, and I read a good bit of back-and-
> forth between her and "Mung" and it seems she was just estimating from
> a prediction by Sanford of humanity's future:
> http://www.uncommondescent.com/evolution/new-paper-using-the-avida-evolution-software-shows/#comment-383856
>
> By the way, Sanford posted their correspondence in his blog at her
> request, and she thanked him for it. See message number 59.

I will point out that Sanford explicitly says in the correspondence you
refer to that he does indeed hold to the opinion that all species were
separately created a few thousand years ago. He just says there is
another possible interpretation, that there is some kind of unknown
restorative force. But again, he is a YEC and explicitly says so in that
post. We could quibble about the difference between 6000 and 10,000. But
why would that be other than a trivial difference?

>> Is there any major doubt as to what kind of book he would be editing?
>> Hint: the subject isn't horticulture. Some but not all of the authors
>> are known.
>
> But you don't know the identity of a single one, eh? Neither do I,
> although I thought the Panda's Thumb people would know.

We know some of the participants in the meeting. It's a proceedings
volume. It contains papers presented at the meeting. Therefore we know
some of the authors.

[Ron O]

On Mar 3, 8:41 am, Ernest Major <{$t...@meden.demon.co.uk> wrote:
> In message
> <02b480a3-27c4-451c-a2ed-da0eb9245...@t16g2000yqt.googlegroups.com>, Ron
> O <rokim...@cox.net> writes

> I'm confused.http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/wic.htmlcovers a wide

> variety of creationist positions - not just YEC.
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> >I do not deny the usual definiton.  I just claim that it is outdated
> >and has not kept up with reality.  The major creationist efforts in
> >the last 10 years has been to lie about being creationists in any way
> >that they think that they can get away with.  Even the fundy YEC
> >creationists at the Discovery Institute claim that ID is not
> >creationism.  Who should believe that when all the proponents that I
> >know of believe in some type of creator god?  So I just use the
> >standard definition of creationist that anyone can look up because
> >that is the definition that matters in terms of what the ID perps are
> >doing and why they are doing it.
>
> >My definition is the standard definition.  If you believe in a creator
> >you are a creationist.  There are a lot of creationist and they range
> >from fundy types to guys that just believe that God created your
> >immortal soul or just got the universe going.  Just because there are
> >a lot of different types of creationists does not make them any less
> >creationists.
>
> Your definition is wider than common usage (and not useful).
>
> To assert that belief in a creator is all that is necessary to be a
> creationist is to commit the etymological fallacy. In common usage
> creationism entails some religiously motivated rejection of scientific
> consensus knowledge.
> --
> alias Ernest Major

Isn't that exactly what the ID perps are doing? Have you read the
switch scam? Do you know that all it is is naysaying and repetition
of a lot of the old scientific creationist arguments? Moths, not
enough transitional fossils, everything is too complex or we don't
know something yet.

What you are describing describes the current ID scam and the ID
perps. They are creationists even by your definition. They are
religiously motivated, they do reject scientific consensus so what is
your beef? Not only that, but they are creationists because they
believe in a supernatural creator for religious reasons.

You are the second fellow (I think that the other was Burkhard) that
would call the ID perps creationists by their definition. Face the
facts, you can be YEC and not be the type of creationist that matters
in these discussions. So the effort should be to identify the
creationists and then determine what type they are. I am the one that
is saying that there are all types of creationists.

No etymological fallacy apparent.

Why accept the bogus claims of the ID perps when you know that they
are only doing it so that they can lie about their reiligious
motivation? Do you deny that they are lying about their religious
motivation? Just look at Behe the least "creationist" of the ID perps
he is supposed to belongs to other conservative religiously motivated
organizations and not just the Discovery Institute. Why? Does Behe
deny scienrific consensus? Isn't Behe a creationist by your
definition?

Ron Okimoto

[Ernest Major]

In message
<199060b6-9f05-425f...@t15g2000yqi.googlegroups.com>, Ron
O <roki...@cox.net> writes

I never suggested that the Discovery Institute and their fellow
travellers were not creationists. Part of my intended point was that
your overbroad definition obscures the issue as to whether they are
creationists as generally understood.

>
>You are the second fellow (I think that the other was Burkhard) that
>would call the ID perps creationists by their definition. Face the
>facts, you can be YEC and not be the type of creationist that matters
>in these discussions. So the effort should be to identify the
>creationists and then determine what type they are. I am the one that
>is saying that there are all types of creationists.

But there are very few people (of whom I am not one) who narrowly
restrict the concept. The problem is not that your definition includes
Dembski and Behe; it's that it includes Miller and Collins and Ayala.
>
>No etymological fallacy apparent.

I'd like you to reconsider. To claim that belief in a creator is
sufficient to make one a creationist, in spite of the discordance with
common usage, looks like the etymological fallacy to me.

>
>Why accept the bogus claims of the ID perps when you know that they
>are only doing it so that they can lie about their reiligious
>motivation? Do you deny that they are lying about their religious
>motivation? Just look at Behe the least "creationist" of the ID perps
>he is supposed to belongs to other conservative religiously motivated
>organizations and not just the Discovery Institute. Why? Does Behe
>deny scienrific consensus? Isn't Behe a creationist by your
>definition?

See above.
--
alias Ernest Major

[Paul Ciszek]

In article <6ab9c992-9a04-4071...@s7g2000vby.googlegroups.com>,

pnyikos <nyi...@bellsouth.net> wrote:
>
>Looks like I did a little more digging than you did, because I found
>the names of the other editors on that Panda's Thumb blog:
>
>Marks II, R.J.; Behe, M.J.; Dembski, W.A.; Gordon, B.L.;
>
>I know the middle two aren't creationists in the usual t.o. senses;
>what about the other two?

Dembski believes in a global flood and that bible trumps physical
evidence, at least when his paycheck depends on saying he believes
those things. So, he is a creationist so long as he is on the
clock.

You may argue that those statements "don't count" since he was only
trying to keep his job, but that doesn't help his credibility.
Dembski is the equivalent of one of those "scientists" hired by
tobacco companies to claim that smoking tobacco doesn't cause lung
cancer.

--
Please reply to: | "Evolution is a theory that accounts
pciszek at panix dot com | for variety, not superiority."
Autoreply has been disabled | -- Joan Pontius

[Paul Ciszek]

In article <QhrL+9F2...@meden.invalid>,

Ernest Major <{$to$}@meden.demon.co.uk> wrote:
>>
>>My definition is the standard definition. If you believe in a creator
>>you are a creationist. There are a lot of creationist and they range
>>from fundy types to guys that just believe that God created your
>>immortal soul or just got the universe going. Just because there are
>>a lot of different types of creationists does not make them any less
>>creationists.
>
>Your definition is wider than common usage (and not useful).
>
>To assert that belief in a creator is all that is necessary to be a
>creationist is to commit the etymological fallacy. In common usage
>creationism entails some religiously motivated rejection of scientific
>consensus knowledge.

Ayup. When it comes to the battle for scientific integrity in schools
and universities, people's actual religious beliefs do not enter the
discussion so long as they do not make claims counter to the scientific
evidence. If someone believes that life on Earth evolved as shown in
the fossil record, but that approximately 2,000 years ago some
Palestinian walked on water and fed a multidude, they are not a
"creationist" as far as this battle is concerned, and there is no reason
they could not teach a valid paleontology course. Just keep them
away from the history department.

--
"Remember when teachers, public employees, Planned Parenthood, NPR and PBS
crashed the stock market, wiped out half of our 401Ks, took trillions in
TARP money, spilled oil in the Gulf of Mexico, gave themselves billions in
bonuses, and paid no taxes? Yeah, me neither."

[Robert Carnegie: Fnord: cc talk-origins@moderators.isc.org]

On Saturday, March 3, 2012 2:20:15 PM UTC, Ron O wrote:
> You posted the usual TO definition when just about all we had to
> contend with were YEC creationists. As you indicate the ID perps use
> this definition to make bogus denials about what they are and why they
> are doing it. You have to look at why Nyikos is making his stupid
> denial.
>
> I do not deny the usual definiton. I just claim that it is outdated
> and has not kept up with reality. The major creationist efforts in
> the last 10 years has been to lie about being creationists in any way
> that they think that they can get away with. Even the fundy YEC
> creationists at the Discovery Institute claim that ID is not
> creationism. Who should believe that when all the proponents that I
> know of believe in some type of creator god? So I just use the
> standard definition of creationist that anyone can look up because
> that is the definition that matters in terms of what the ID perps are
> doing and why they are doing it.
>
> My definition is the standard definition. If you believe in a creator
> you are a creationist. There are a lot of creationist and they range
> from fundy types to guys that just believe that God created your
> immortal soul or just got the universe going. Just because there are
> a lot of different types of creationists does not make them any less
> creationists.

I disagree. "Creationism" isn't "belief in an individual whose personal acts brought into being the natural world in its present state, give or take human contributions"; it is specifically the doctrine in biology that says, for YEC, the modern "kinds" are, and are descended from, the distinct "kinds" that God created for (and including) Adam, 6010 years ago; or, for not-YEC, it wasn't exactly 6010 years and it may have been not all at the same time, but every kind exists because God created it sometime out of nothing. (Or of clay, or maybe out of microbes, that don't really count as living things.) They also call it "Scientific Creationism" and "Creation Science".

And Intelligent Design is a filthy wicked lie but it isn't creationism. It's the weed that grows from the place where creationism was buried.

[Ron O]

On Mar 3, 10:33 am, Ernest Major <{$t...@meden.demon.co.uk> wrote:
> In message

> <199060b6-9f05-425f-8ec6-e45327071...@t15g2000yqi.googlegroups.com>, Ron

> >> I'm confused.http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/wic.htmlcoversa wide

At this time you have Nyikos using the definition as it is generally
understood to be (yours is not general) to say that the ID perps and
himself are not Biblical literalist "creationists" as the term is
usually applied here in order to deny that the ID perps are not
creationists. Do you see your problem?

>
> >You are the second fellow (I think that the other was Burkhard) that
> >would call the ID perps creationists by their definition.  Face the
> >facts, you can be YEC and not be the type of creationist that matters
> >in these discussions.  So the effort should be to identify the
> >creationists and then determine what type they are.  I am the one that
> >is saying that there are all types of creationists.
>
> But there are very few people (of whom I am not one) who narrowly
> restrict the concept. The problem is not that your definition includes
> Dembski and Behe; it's that it includes Miller and Collins and Ayala.

So? What is the difference between the different creationists that
you listed. That is the important difference, not whether they are
creationists or not. Are Miller, Collins, and Ayala non creationist
creationists? You have the same problem that you claim that I do.
You claim that I would have to define my definition all the time, but
so do you because yours isn't the general definition either. Call
them what they are and let what they do and are make the difference.
The ID perps and Nyikos don't like that because they know that they
come up short and can't dodge what they are if they aren't
prevaricating and making the usual fundy definition of creationist an
issue. That is not the issue. You know that as well as I because
your definition isn't the usual fundy definition.

>
> >No etymological fallacy apparent.
>
> I'd like you to reconsider. To claim that belief in a creator is
> sufficient to make one a creationist, in spite of the discordance with
> common usage, looks like the etymological fallacy to me.

No one said that it was sufficient. There isn't a single definition
that covers all the various characters in detail. My definition is
just the basic definition, and it works. Get Nyikos to agree with
your definition when he is denying that he and the ID perps are
creationists.

>
> >Why accept the bogus claims of the ID perps when you know that they
> >are only doing it so that they can lie about their reiligious
> >motivation?  Do you deny that they are lying about their religious
> >motivation?  Just look at Behe the least "creationist" of the ID perps
> >he is supposed to belongs to other conservative religiously motivated
> >organizations and not just the Discovery Institute.  Why?  Does Behe
> >deny scienrific consensus?  Isn't Behe a creationist by your
> >definition?
>
> See above.
> --
> alias Ernest Major

Go for it. Get Nyikos to agree with your definition. Remember that
your definition includes the ID perps like Dembski and Behe, and like
Nyikos they deny being creationists. Do you understand how they
prevaricate about what they are? You will find that you have the same
problem that I do, and that you will have to explain the difference
between various creationists in order to make your point, so what is
the difference?

Ron Okimoto

[Ray Martinez]

> Ron Okimoto- Hide quoted text -
>
> - Show quoted text -

Wrong; if you accept immaterial causation operating in reality the
same makes you a Creationist, not ambiguous "If you believe in a
Creator."

Ray

[Ernest Major]

In message
<e1757266-3df1-4157...@k24g2000yqe.googlegroups.com>, Ray
Martinez <pyram...@yahoo.com> writes

>On Mar 3, 6:20 am, Ron O <rokim...@cox.net> wrote:
>> On Mar 3, 7:44 am, "Robert Carnegie: Fnord: cc talk-
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> orig...@moderators.isc.org" <rja.carne...@excite.com> wrote:
>> > On Saturday, March 3, 2012 12:27:49 PM UTC, Ron O wrote:
>> > > What does denial get you?  Hairsplitting prevarication just isn't
>> > > anything to base a conclusion on.  Both Dembski and Behe have admitted
>> > > to being creationists.  They both admit that their intelligent
>> > > designer/creator is the Biblical god.  Do you deny that?  My guess is
>> > > that all the editors are creationists, though I haven't seen anywhere
>> > > that they admit to it.
>>
>> > Technically "intelligent design" doesn't require creationism - as
>> >you acknowledge.
>>
>> > "What is Creationism?" (Mark Isaak, 2000, 2002)
>> > <http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/wic.html>
>> > describes points of view that are, may be, and
>> > emphatically aren't "Creationism".  By the way, Charles Johnson is
>> >dead and so is Flat-earthism, but he wasn't dead in 2000.
>>
>> > <http://www.bbc.co.uk/religion/religions/christianity/beliefs/creation...>
>> > also goes into it.
>>
>> > I hold that for a belief to be creationism, it must say that all
>> >"kinds" of life large enough to be seen with the naked eye - or, to
>> >be specific, human beings - exist corporeally because they or their

>> >population were created in the past by a process different from
>> >normal biological reproduction.  So if you believe that God made the

>> >footed Cretaceous walking cuckoo by telling the two-footed
>> >Cretaceous walking cuckoo to grow two extra legs, that isn't
>> >"creationism".  It isn't right either, in my opinion.  And you could
>> >still be a Creationist just for humans.
>>
>> > "Microevolution" is allowed in creationism, "macroevolution" isn't;
>> >"macroevolution" is where a new "kind" arises by descent from a
>> >pre-existing kind, such as if God decided that from now on snakes
>> >shouldn't have legs... whoops.  Actually, I don't believe the story,
>> >but I also think it doesn't necessarily mean that God made snakes'
>> >legs fall off, only that he was insulting a disabled creature.  But
>> >in the circumstance it's arguably excusable.
>>
>> > And of course "intelligent design" was invented to be "the part of
>> >creationism that contradicts the theory of evolution, but without
>> >being overtly religious and therefore excluded from public-funded

>> >the U.S."
>>
>> > It's therefore very important to ID that at least some of its
>> >advocates do not publicly embrace creationism.  This is why I've
>> >said that intelligent design is for lying thieving cowards who deny

Have you changed your position? The above makes theistic evolution
creationism. It's functionally much the same as Ron's definition, and
makes great numbers of people who you claim are atheists creationists as
well.

Where you not previously insisting on the rejection of all material
causation to qualify as a creationist?

(In case it has escaped your attention, hypothesis can be stated
involving a mixture of material and immaterial causation.)
>
>Ray
>

--
Stewart Robert Hinsley

[John Harshman]

This should be easy to settle. Forget Behe. Ron, is Kenneth Miller a
creationist? He certainly believes in a creator. How about Theodosius
Dobzhansky?

Then again, Behe does seem to fit Ernest's definition, since he does
reject (and we can presume for religious reasons) a reasonable amount of
common scientific knowledge, such as the power of natural selection.

[Ron O]

On Mar 3, 4:55 pm, John Harshman <jharsh...@pacbell.net> wrote:
> Ernest Major wrote:
> > In message

> > <199060b6-9f05-425f-8ec6-e45327071...@t15g2000yqi.googlegroups.com>, Ron

> >>> I'm confused.http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/wic.htmlcoversa wide

Why forget about Behe? Ken Miller is a creationist and he likely
would agree that he is one, he just isn't one like Behe or Ken Ham or
Dembski or Philip Johnson or etc. He might be as much a theistic
evolutionist as Behe or Johnson. There are a lot of different types
of creationists. The ones that you want to put on one side are the
guys like the ID perps. Once you establish that someone is a
creationist, then the argument is what kind. The ID perps and guys
like Nyikos want to deny that they are creationists so that the
question of what kind of creationist they are is lost in the shuffle.
They only use the fundy definition of creationist to make that
denial. If you want to let them do that then go with the fundy
definition. Just watch how Nyikos keeps denying that he is a
creationist and how the guys like Behe and Dembski deny it in the same
way for the same reason. They are not IDiots or ID perps because they
are not creationist.

>
> Then again, Behe does seem to fit Ernest's definition, since he does
> reject (and we can presume for religious reasons) a reasonable amount of
> common scientific knowledge, such as the power of natural selection.

See it depends on what type of creationist Behe is. You can't pigeion
hole these guys and Ernest's definition isn't the usual fundy
definition of creationist that is used around here. He would have to
define creationist as much as I have to. I just don't give the IDiots
the chance at first bogus denial.

Ron Okimoto

[Dana Tweedy]

On 3/3/12 2:34 PM, Ray Martinez wrote:
snip

>>
>> My definition is the standard definition. If you believe in a creator
>> you are a creationist. There are a lot of creationist and they range
>> from fundy types to guys that just believe that God created your
>> immortal soul or just got the universe going. Just because there are
>> a lot of different types of creationists does not make them any less
>> creationists.
>>
>> Ron Okimoto- Hide quoted text -
>>
>> - Show quoted text -
>
> Wrong; if you accept immaterial causation operating in reality the
> same makes you a Creationist,

So, if someone believes that God (immaterial causation) makes use of
natural processes (material causation) that makes that person a
Creationist? If so, most theistic evolutionists are "Creationists".

> not ambiguous "If you believe in a
> Creator."

Why is your own ambiguous "immaterial causation" not a belief in a
creator?


DJT

[Ray Martinez]

On Mar 3, 5:32 pm, Dana Tweedy <reddfrog...@gmail.com> wrote:
> On 3/3/12 2:34 PM, Ray Martinez wrote:
> snip
>
>
>
> >> My definition is the standard definition.  If you believe in a creator
> >> you are a creationist.  There are a lot of creationist and they range
> >> from fundy types to guys that just believe that God created your
> >> immortal soul or just got the universe going.  Just because there are
> >> a lot of different types of creationists does not make them any less
> >> creationists.
>
> >> Ron Okimoto- Hide quoted text -
>
> >> - Show quoted text -
>
> > Wrong; if you accept immaterial causation operating in reality the
> > same makes you a Creationist,
>
> So, if someone believes that God (immaterial causation) makes use of
> natural processes (material causation) that makes that person a
> Creationist?   If so, most theistic evolutionists are "Creationists".
>

Since the rise of Darwinism "natural processes" means the supernatural
is not involved, ruled out. Those who believe otherwise are anti-
science in the eyes of the establishment, however. The phraseology of
your comments indicates acceptance of natural processes (non-
involvement of God). So these persons are not Creationists. To simply
believe God set a process that shows no signs of His involvement in
motion does not infringe the meaning of natural processes.

Your beef should be with Ron O, not me. He is the one arguing
acceptance of Creator = Creationist (ambiguous).

> > not ambiguous "If you believe in a
> > Creator."
>
> Why is your own ambiguous "immaterial causation" not a belief in a
> creator?
>
> DJT

How is what I said ambiguous?

Ray

[John Harshman]

So it's a pretty useless word, then. And I doubt that Miller would agree
to being a creationist.

> He might be as much a theistic
> evolutionist as Behe or Johnson. There are a lot of different types
> of creationists. The ones that you want to put on one side are the
> guys like the ID perps. Once you establish that someone is a
> creationist, then the argument is what kind. The ID perps and guys
> like Nyikos want to deny that they are creationists so that the
> question of what kind of creationist they are is lost in the shuffle.
> They only use the fundy definition of creationist to make that
> denial. If you want to let them do that then go with the fundy
> definition. Just watch how Nyikos keeps denying that he is a
> creationist and how the guys like Behe and Dembski deny it in the same
> way for the same reason.

In what way is Nyikos a creationist? He has never, as far as I know,
said he believes in a creator.

[Ron O]

It would seem that any use of the word is pretty useless unless you
define what you mean.

That is just the way things are as long as there are people that will
lie about being creationists in order to be like the Discovery
Institute ID perps.

I believe that Miller has said that he was a creationist, just not the
fundy type, probably some type of theistic evolutionist. I recall
something where he said he made no bones about believing in a creator
god. He obviously does not rule out the science and so he is likely
the same as Collins with God in there somewhere.

>
> > He might be as much a theistic
> > evolutionist as Behe or Johnson.  There are a lot of different types
> > of creationists.  The ones that you want to put on one side are the
> > guys like the ID perps.  Once you establish that someone is a
> > creationist, then the argument is what kind.  The ID perps and guys
> > like Nyikos want to deny that they are creationists so that the
> > question of what kind of creationist they are is lost in the shuffle.
> > They only use the fundy definition of creationist to make that
> > denial.  If you want to let them do that then go with the fundy
> > definition.  Just watch how Nyikos keeps denying that he is a
> > creationist and how the guys like Behe and Dembski deny it in the same
> > way for the same reason.
>
> In what way is Nyikos a creationist? He has never, as far as I know,
> said he believes in a creator.

Nyikos admitted that he was a Christian over a year ago. He just
claimed that he was unconventional in his beliefs. He has dodged
stating where his creator fits in, but he just claimed last week that
he will finally come clean next week. Don't ask me why he put it off
for a week after dodging for a year. So we will see. If he does
finally say I'll let you know. He has constantly dodged claiming that
he isn't the fundy type of creationist, but that is the same thing
that a lot of the ID perps claim and Major's definition would define
them as creationists, just not the fundy type of creationist. My
definition is actually the standard definition and covers all
creationists. Once we get that far then you have to determine what
type of creationist they are. I use the standard definition because
it makes guys like Nyikos squirm. I have no problem admitting that I
am a creationist because I don't have anything to hide in that
regard. The fundy definition doesn't apply to me and Major's
definition doesn't apply to me because I am not that type of
creationist. The fundy definition allows guys like the ID perps to
lie to themselves about why they believe what they do.

You have to admit that guys like Behe and Dembski would deny that they
were creationists if Major called them creationists. He would have to
define what his definition was and what they do is repeat that they
are not fundy types of creationists, run or change the subject. What
do Behe and Dembski do when someone calls them a creationist? Isn't
the fundy definition the basis of their denial? Does the fundy
definition matter in their case as to their being creationists or
not? Major would say no and so would I. I keep saying that these
guys are not bogus because they are creationist, but because of what
they do because they are creationists.

Ron Okimoto

[Dana Tweedy]

On 3/3/12 6:59 PM, Ray Martinez wrote:
> On Mar 3, 5:32 pm, Dana Tweedy<reddfrog...@gmail.com> wrote:
>> On 3/3/12 2:34 PM, Ray Martinez wrote:
>> snip
>>
>>
>>
>>>> My definition is the standard definition. If you believe in a creator
>>>> you are a creationist. There are a lot of creationist and they range
>>>> from fundy types to guys that just believe that God created your
>>>> immortal soul or just got the universe going. Just because there are
>>>> a lot of different types of creationists does not make them any less
>>>> creationists.
>>
>>>> Ron Okimoto- Hide quoted text -
>>
>>>> - Show quoted text -
>>
>>> Wrong; if you accept immaterial causation operating in reality the
>>> same makes you a Creationist,
>>
>> So, if someone believes that God (immaterial causation) makes use of
>> natural processes (material causation) that makes that person a
>> Creationist? If so, most theistic evolutionists are "Creationists".
>>
>
> Since the rise of Darwinism "natural processes" means the supernatural
> is not involved, ruled out.

Ray, no one but you has ever said this, and you've been shown that it's
wrong, time and time again. While science doesn't make use of appeals
to the supernatural, there's nothing that prevents individuals from
believing in the supernatural, and believing that God makes use of
natural processes.

> Those who believe otherwise are anti-
> science in the eyes of the establishment, however.

Wrong again, Ray. Science doesn't have the ability to determine the
existence, or non existence of the supernatural, so there's no
"establishment" that can "see" people in that way.

>The phraseology of
> your comments indicates acceptance of natural processes (non-
> involvement of God).

Natural processes do not necessarily rule out the existence of, or
involvement of God. That's your own false assumption.

> So these persons are not Creationists.

Except that those persons believe God created, using evolution.

> To simply
> believe God set a process that shows no signs of His involvement in
> motion does not infringe the meaning of natural processes.

That's not what most theistic evolutionists believe.

>
> Your beef should be with Ron O, not me. He is the one arguing
> acceptance of Creator = Creationist (ambiguous).

No, you are the one offering an ambiguous label, and complaining about
another person's ambiguity. I don't see how Ron's usage is any more
ambiguous than your own.

>
>>> not ambiguous "If you believe in a
>>> Creator."
>>
>> Why is your own ambiguous "immaterial causation" not a belief in a
>> creator?
>>
>> DJT
>
> How is what I said ambiguous?

The term "immaterial causation" is ambiguous, as there is no mechanism
offered, just that it's "immaterial". Why isn't belief in a creator
the same thing as claiming the causation is 'immaterial'?


DJT

[Robert Carnegie: Fnord: cc talk-origins@moderators.isc.org]

Maybe he didn't understand the word either, then.

Creationism is a term in paleobiology that means
the belief that living things exist in their diverse
kinds - or that humans exist - because they are as
God (or an Intelligent Designer) created them out
of nothing, or out of unliving matter, and no
evolution between kinds has taken place. That is
the great point of creationism, that last:
/no evolution/. No men descended from monkeys.

God progressively fiddling about with things
that he'd created previously needs a different
name. "Evolution" will do for that, I think.

[Ernest Major]

In message
<20445989.1623.1330856280247.JavaMail.geo-discussion-forums@vbxv4>,
"Robert Carnegie: Fnord: cc talk-o...@moderators.isc.org"
<rja.ca...@excite.com> writes

Your definition is too narrow. It excludes Ken Ham and Tony Pagano, and
a great number of Young Earth Hyperevolutionists.
--
alias Ernest Major

[Ron O]

On Mar 4, 4:18 am, "Robert Carnegie: Fnord: cc talk-

That is one definition, but is too exclusive and narrow even for TO.
Where do non biblical creationists such as Kalk fit in or a lot of old
earth creationists that do not think that there were successive mass
creations?

>
> God progressively fiddling about with things
> that he'd created previously needs a different
> name.  "Evolution" will do for that, I think.

Even the ID perps wouldn't agree with that definition of creationist
and "evolution" because a lot of them are tweeker creationists, and
they still fall in with the Biblical literalist faction on some basic
beliefs about creation and opposition to biological evolution.

Ron Okimoto

[Ron O]

On Mar 4, 5:22 am, Ernest Major <{$t...@meden.demon.co.uk> wrote:
> In message
> <20445989.1623.1330856280247.JavaMail.geo-discussion-forums@vbxv4>,

> "Robert Carnegie: Fnord: cc talk-orig...@moderators.isc.org"
> <rja.carne...@excite.com> writes

Hyperevolutionist creationists. Ken Ham may be among the worst. He
is one of the 6000 year creationists and he believes that all the
existing and extinct post flood species (such as the Ice Age fauna)
evolved within less than 5000 years. The examples up at the creation
museum were all cats and dogs (from tabby to the saber tooth monsters,
and from foxes to wolves) were derived from a pair of cats and dogs
that were on the ark. We have DNA from saber tooth cats from the ice
age and their DNA is around 3 times as different from tabby as our DNA
is from chimps. Foxes are nearly that divergent from wolves (2 times
as different as we are from chimps). So their examples would require
over twice as much change in the DNA as has occurred between chimps
and humans. That should be hyperevolution in anyone's book. It won't
be long before they are claiming that chimps evolved from the humans
on the ark and we are one kind.

Ron Okimoto

[Robert Carnegie: Fnord: cc talk-origins@moderators.isc.org]

I don't think that can be the case, because
I want a clause that it's creationism if you
apply it /only/ to humans. Also, that other
critters don't have to be created at the same
time, even though the bible says that is what
God was doing in October, 4004 BC. I was about
one word away from including the Catholic church,
where human /souls/ are hand-made in Heaven
before use. So what did I do wrong?

Except in the obvious sense, I don't see why
you shouldn't believe in evolution for plant and
animal origins, but creation for humans.

[John Harshman]

Unless you're Humpty Dumpty, however, you can't just enforce your
personal meaning on everyone. This definition thing has a social
component. Communication is in theory the goal, so we should come to
some agreement.

> That is just the way things are as long as there are people that will
> lie about being creationists in order to be like the Discovery
> Institute ID perps.
>
> I believe that Miller has said that he was a creationist,

Can you find an actual statement?

> just not the
> fundy type, probably some type of theistic evolutionist. I recall
> something where he said he made no bones about believing in a creator
> god. He obviously does not rule out the science and so he is likely
> the same as Collins with God in there somewhere.

So the question is whether it's useful to call such people creationists.
I suggest that it isn't, because the useful distinction is between
creationists and mainstream science. If you accept all of mainstream
science it just isn't useful to call you a creationist. We can still
make distinctions among creationists based on the particular tenets of
mainstream science they reject.

>>> He might be as much a theistic
>>> evolutionist as Behe or Johnson. There are a lot of different types
>>> of creationists. The ones that you want to put on one side are the
>>> guys like the ID perps. Once you establish that someone is a
>>> creationist, then the argument is what kind. The ID perps and guys
>>> like Nyikos want to deny that they are creationists so that the
>>> question of what kind of creationist they are is lost in the shuffle.
>>> They only use the fundy definition of creationist to make that
>>> denial. If you want to let them do that then go with the fundy
>>> definition. Just watch how Nyikos keeps denying that he is a
>>> creationist and how the guys like Behe and Dembski deny it in the same
>>> way for the same reason.
>> In what way is Nyikos a creationist? He has never, as far as I know,
>> said he believes in a creator.
>
> Nyikos admitted that he was a Christian over a year ago.

Yes, but he's also a Christian agnostic: he agrees that the evidence for
God's existence is weak, but he's a Christian because he would like it
to be true. Nor is a Christian necessarily a creationist, unless we
adopt your position in which the term is synonymous with "theist".

> He just
> claimed that he was unconventional in his beliefs. He has dodged
> stating where his creator fits in, but he just claimed last week that
> he will finally come clean next week. Don't ask me why he put it off
> for a week after dodging for a year. So we will see. If he does
> finally say I'll let you know. He has constantly dodged claiming that
> he isn't the fundy type of creationist,

Not true. In fact he has been exceedingly clear on the subject. Old
earth, common descent, natural processes. His only approach to
creationism is the fine-tuning argument. His version of ID for the
bacterial flagellum and such is purely and explicitly naturalistic. A
weird position but not creationism by any stretch, as he claims the
Designers evolved naturally.

> but that is the same thing
> that a lot of the ID perps claim and Major's definition would define
> them as creationists, just not the fundy type of creationist. My
> definition is actually the standard definition and covers all
> creationists.

Standard in what sense? You seem to be the only person using it. Though
not quite. Some years ago at the North American SF convention (Worldcon
was somewhere else that year) there was a panel discussion organized
between creationists and "evolutionists". At the very outset it became
apparent that the so-called creationists were merely creationist in your
sense: they accepted all of mainstream science but thought that God had
been in some way involved. The panel was forced to adjourn because no
source for argument could be found.

> Once we get that far then you have to determine what
> type of creationist they are. I use the standard definition because
> it makes guys like Nyikos squirm.

In other words, you're being an asshole for the fun of it?

> I have no problem admitting that I
> am a creationist because I don't have anything to hide in that
> regard. The fundy definition doesn't apply to me and Major's
> definition doesn't apply to me because I am not that type of
> creationist. The fundy definition allows guys like the ID perps to
> lie to themselves about why they believe what they do.

Major's definition isn't the fundy one, you will note. And it does apply
to Behe.

> You have to admit that guys like Behe and Dembski would deny that they
> were creationists if Major called them creationists.

Yet they fit his definition. Don't be too sure that Behe would deny it,
though. He has been forced to acknowledge several YEC beliefs in the
past few years, whether he really believes them or not.

> He would have to
> define what his definition was and what they do is repeat that they
> are not fundy types of creationists, run or change the subject. What
> do Behe and Dembski do when someone calls them a creationist? Isn't
> the fundy definition the basis of their denial? Does the fundy
> definition matter in their case as to their being creationists or
> not? Major would say no and so would I. I keep saying that these
> guys are not bogus because they are creationist, but because of what
> they do because they are creationists.

So what makes Peter a creationist other than the sense in which you are?
Why should we care if he's just like you?

[John Harshman]

No, you forgot the weasel-phrase, "between kinds". Hyperevolution is all
within kinds.

[Ron O]

On Mar 4, 9:44 am, John Harshman <jharsh...@pacbell.net> wrote:
> Ron O wrote:
> > On Mar 3, 8:24 pm, John Harshman <jharsh...@pacbell.net> wrote:
> >> Ron O wrote:
> >>> On Mar 3, 4:55 pm, John Harshman <jharsh...@pacbell.net> wrote:
> >>>> Ernest Major wrote:
> >>>>> In message
> >>>>> <199060b6-9f05-425f-8ec6-e45327071...@t15g2000yqi.googlegroups.com>, Ron
> >>>>> O <rokim...@cox.net> writes
> >>>>>> On Mar 3, 8:41 am, Ernest Major <{$t...@meden.demon.co.uk> wrote:
> >>>>>>> In message
> >>>>>>> <02b480a3-27c4-451c-a2ed-da0eb9245...@t16g2000yqt.googlegroups.com>, Ron
> >>>>>>> O <rokim...@cox.net> writes
> >>>>>>>> On Mar 3, 7:44 am, "Robert Carnegie: Fnord: cc talk-
> >>>>>>>> orig...@moderators.isc.org" <rja.carne...@excite.com> wrote:
> >>>>>>>>> On Saturday, March 3, 2012 12:27:49 PM UTC, Ron O wrote:

SNIP

> >>>> This should be easy to settle. Forget Behe. Ron, is Kenneth Miller a
> >>>> creationist? He certainly believes in a creator. How about Theodosius
> >>>> Dobzhansky?
> >>> Why forget about Behe? Ken Miller is a creationist and he likely
> >>> would agree that he is one, he just isn't one like Behe or Ken Ham or
> >>> Dembski or Philip Johnson or etc.
> >> So it's a pretty useless word, then. And I doubt that Miller would agree
> >> to being a creationist.
>
> > It would seem that any use of the word is pretty useless unless you
> > define what you mean.
>
> Unless you're Humpty Dumpty, however, you can't just enforce your
> personal meaning on everyone. This definition thing has a social
> component. Communication is in theory the goal, so we should come to
> some agreement.

Major's definition isn't the usual definition either. You are just
restating the facts. There are different ways of dealing with the
situation. You can stick with the usual fundy definition that is used
on TO (not a good option for the dishonest IDiots and ID perps). You
can go with my option or something like Major's option. Both options
require definition of what is a creationist. My option the IDiots
can't deny that they are creationists, and have to differentiate
themselves in some meaningful way from other creationists that they do
not want to be associated with. Major would produce his definition
when he got the usual denial of being a creationist and what would
happen? What does happen is that the IDiots and ID perps continue to
claim that they are not creationists (they can't do that under my
definition) and the blow smoke about how Major's definition doesn't
apply to them anyway. That is how it always goes down. Nyikos is
just an example of that. Do the ID perps at the Discovery Institute
deny being creationists? Yes. What happens when someone takes them
to task for that? This is just the reality of the situation.

>
> > That is just the way things are as long as there are people that will
> > lie about being creationists in order to be like the Discovery
> > Institute ID perps.
>
> > I believe that Miller has said that he was a creationist,
>
> Can you find an actual statement?

Probably not. It may have been put up at the Panda's Thumb, but it
could have been ARN or even here. It was probably at least 6 or 7
years ago and may have been an older quote than that. I do recall
that the quote included something like "I make no bones about the
fact" so using that quote and Ken or Kenneth Miller might turn up
something if the links are not broken.

I tried it but you end up with a bunch of junk to wade through and
Miller uses the expression quite often.

>
> > just not the
> > fundy type, probably some type of theistic evolutionist. I recall
> > something where he said he made no bones about believing in a creator
> > god. He obviously does not rule out the science and so he is likely
> > the same as Collins with God in there somewhere.
>
> So the question is whether it's useful to call such people creationists.
> I suggest that it isn't, because the useful distinction is between
> creationists and mainstream science. If you accept all of mainstream
> science it just isn't useful to call you a creationist. We can still
> make distinctions among creationists based on the particular tenets of
> mainstream science they reject.

My point is that the other option allows the dishonest to blow smoke.
My option makes them admit that they are creationists and then defend
themselves. Nothing works that well against the dishonest. Look at
how Nyikos has sidestepped the issue for over a year and keeps
repeating that he isn't the fundy type of creationist. He just
doesn't answer the question. My way make the guys look as bogus as we
all know that they are. After we determine who is or isn't a
creationists then the liars have to come up with some way to
distinguish themselves from what they claim that they are not. Then
they have to demonstrate that they are not Major's type of creationist
while knowing that they are creationists. My definition just makes it
easier to make it evident that they are lying. Nyikos is a case in
point because he has had to manipulate posts and delete my definition
of creationists in order to keep from admitting that he is a
creationist. Honest people do not do bogus things like that. What is
sad is that I admit to being a creationist so just being a creationist
is not the issue. The issue is what type of creationist the person
is, and Nyikos is the type that has lied about the ID scam and tried
to defend the ID perps for over a year.

SNIP:

> >> In what way is Nyikos a creationist? He has never, as far as I know,
> >> said he believes in a creator.
>
> > Nyikos admitted that he was a Christian over a year ago.
>
> Yes, but he's also a Christian agnostic: he agrees that the evidence for
> God's existence is weak, but he's a Christian because he would like it
> to be true. Nor is a Christian necessarily a creationist, unless we
> adopt your position in which the term is synonymous with "theist".

He hasn't claimed to be an agnostic, not to me. He just rambles on
about less than 1% probability and "hope" instead of the usual
"faith." That isn't claiming to be an agnostic because religious
belief isn't based on probability, and he can still believe in
something no matter how low the probability is. He just keeps
evading.

>
> > He just
> > claimed that he was unconventional in his beliefs. He has dodged
> > stating where his creator fits in, but he just claimed last week that
> > he will finally come clean next week. Don't ask me why he put it off
> > for a week after dodging for a year. So we will see. If he does
> > finally say I'll let you know. He has constantly dodged claiming that
> > he isn't the fundy type of creationist,
>
> Not true. In fact he has been exceedingly clear on the subject. Old
> earth, common descent, natural processes. His only approach to
> creationism is the fine-tuning argument. His version of ID for the
> bacterial flagellum and such is purely and explicitly naturalistic. A
> weird position but not creationism by any stretch, as he claims the
> Designers evolved naturally.

Where is his intelligent designer in the mix? He has been as clear as
mud. How could you be deceived by what he claims? Is Behe a
creationist? Yes. How is Nyikos different? Where do his aliens come
from? Who created his immortal soul? Who created the universe?
Nyikos didn't spend a year defending the ID scam because he was not a
creationist. He didn't start spouting Bible verses in his defense
because he isn't a creationist. We will see next week if he makes
good on his promise.

>
> > but that is the same thing
> > that a lot of the ID perps claim and Major's definition would define
> > them as creationists, just not the fundy type of creationist. My
> > definition is actually the standard definition and covers all
> > creationists.
>
> Standard in what sense? You seem to be the only person using it. Though
> not quite. Some years ago at the North American SF convention (Worldcon
> was somewhere else that year) there was a panel discussion organized
> between creationists and "evolutionists". At the very outset it became
> apparent that the so-called creationists were merely creationist in your
> sense: they accepted all of mainstream science but thought that God had
> been in some way involved. The panel was forced to adjourn because no
> source for argument could be found.

Standard as in terms of what is in the dictionary. There are a lot of
definitions of creationist. Only one is the fundy type. The broad
definition is the one I use.

My Random House College dictionary (1975) just states that "The
doctrine that God immediately creates out of nothing" and the single
example given is a soul for each individual. It doesn't list the
fundy definition of creationism. My Webster dictionary doesn't list
creationism nor creationist. Jillery put up some web definitions that
included my definition and the fundy definition. I haven't seen
Major's definition listed anywhere, but I would agree that it is as
good a definition of the type of creationist that we are concerned
with as any.

>
> > Once we get that far then you have to determine what
> > type of creationist they are. I use the standard definition because
> > it makes guys like Nyikos squirm.
>
> In other words, you're being an asshole for the fun of it?

No, because it doesn't allow them to be dishonest without having to
understand how dishonest they are. If they were honest, they wouldn't
have to squirm. Why let the jerks get away with blowing smoke as if
they had an argument? You have to know that they are laughing at you
as they lie to your face thinking that they are getting away with
something with word games.

>
> > I have no problem admitting that I
> > am a creationist because I don't have anything to hide in that
> > regard. The fundy definition doesn't apply to me and Major's
> > definition doesn't apply to me because I am not that type of
> > creationist. The fundy definition allows guys like the ID perps to
> > lie to themselves about why they believe what they do.
>
> Major's definition isn't the fundy one, you will note. And it does apply
> to Behe.

I have already stated that. That was part of my argument. Major
would have to define what he meant as much as I would, but it is
easier for them to deny what they are since Major's definition
requires the elucidation of what their problem with science is when
they can keep claiming not to be creationists. My way they have to
admit to being creationists and then say why it doesn't matter. Just
check out how the ID perps confuse and lie about the issue. Just
check out how Nyikos is doing it in the By their fruits thread.

>
> > You have to admit that guys like Behe and Dembski would deny that they
> > were creationists if Major called them creationists.
>
> Yet they fit his definition. Don't be too sure that Behe would deny it,
> though. He has been forced to acknowledge several YEC beliefs in the
> past few years, whether he really believes them or not.

Major's definition does not rely on YEC beliefs. When guys like
Dembski and Behe are called creationists they consistently deny that
they are creationists and usually have some qualifiers about biblical
literalist or scientific creationists in their denial when you know
that, that doesn't matter.

I would agree with Major about his definition being a good one for the
faction of creationists that we are concerned with on TO. Kalk is the
type of creationist that we are talking about by Major's definition
and that is the way it should be.

>
> > He would have to
> > define what his definition was and what they do is repeat that they
> > are not fundy types of creationists, run or change the subject. What
> > do Behe and Dembski do when someone calls them a creationist? Isn't
> > the fundy definition the basis of their denial? Does the fundy
> > definition matter in their case as to their being creationists or
> > not? Major would say no and so would I. I keep saying that these
> > guys are not bogus because they are creationist, but because of what
> > they do because they are creationists.
>
> So what makes Peter a creationist other than the sense in which you are?
> Why should we care if he's just like you?

Well he claims to be a Christian, and I haven't met one that isn't a
creationist. Who made Peter being just like me an issue? Did I miss
something somewhere? Isn't it what Peter is that matters? Peter is
supposed to say next week, and I will let you know about what he
claims.

Ron Okimoto

SNIP:

[TomS]

"On Sun, 4 Mar 2012 09:25:15 -0800 (PST), in article
<a77180ac-8260-4449...@a15g2000yqf.googlegroups.com>, Ron O
stated..."
[...snip...]

>My Random House College dictionary (1975) just states that "The
>doctrine that God immediately creates out of nothing" and the single
>example given is a soul for each individual. It doesn't list the
>fundy definition of creationism.

[...snip...]

The old (I'm talking about pre-darwin times) meaning of
"creationism" related to ideas about the origins of souls.
Creationists believed that a soul was created separately, at
the beginning of life, for each individual. There were others
who believed that souls pre-existed the body, and those who
believed that souls were inherited.

One of the problems with defining "creationism" in the
contemporary use of the word is that it covers a wide range of
beliefs, including Young Earth-Noah's Ark and various versions
of Old Earth; while Intelligent Design is deliberately silent
on just about everything. Some ID advocates even accept the
common ancestry of humans with other primates.


--
---Tom S.
"Ah, yeah, well, whenever you notice something like that, a wizard did it"
Lucy Lawless, the Simpsons "Treehouse of Horror X: Desperately Xeeking Xena"
(1999)

[Robert Carnegie: Fnord: cc talk-origins@moderators.isc.org]

On Sunday, March 4, 2012 6:39:43 PM UTC, TomS wrote:
> "On Sun, 4 Mar 2012 09:25:15 -0800 (PST), in article
> <a77180ac-8260-4449...@a15g2000yqf.googlegroups.com>, Ron O
> stated..."
> [...snip...]
> >My Random House College dictionary (1975) just states that "The
> >doctrine that God immediately creates out of nothing" and the single
> >example given is a soul for each individual. It doesn't list the
> >fundy definition of creationism.
> [...snip...]
>
> The old (I'm talking about pre-darwin times) meaning of
> "creationism" related to ideas about the origins of souls.
> Creationists believed that a soul was created separately, at
> the beginning of life, for each individual. There were others
> who believed that souls pre-existed the body, and those who
> believed that souls were inherited.

But, as you say, that's an old meaning of
"creationism", not currently correct. I assume
that it covers what we understand to be the
current Catholic doctrine about souls.

> One of the problems with defining "creationism" in the
> contemporary use of the word is that it covers a wide range of
> beliefs, including Young Earth-Noah's Ark and various versions
> of Old Earth; while Intelligent Design is deliberately silent
> on just about everything. Some ID advocates even accept the
> common ancestry of humans with other primates.

Then they aren't creationists - unless they assert
that God made the primates, of course. Or the
bananas that the primates eat, etc. On the other
hand, I insist on detaching Noah's Ark from
creationism. What creationism is about is the
creating, and the no evťolution.

[John Wilkins]

On 5/03/12 7:15 AM, Robert Carnegie: Fnord: cc

> creating, and the no evolution.
>

I think we need some unique terms:

Creatorism: the view that God created the world and is distinct from it
(aka theism)

Creationism: the view that things as they are now were made by God
sometime in the past

Ancient creationism: the view that God created the world as it is now
(more or less) a long time ago

Recent creationism: the view that God created the world as it is now
(more or less) only a few thousand years ago

Arkism: the view that there were only so many kinds as could fit on the
Ark a few thousand years ago (leading to hyperevolutionism to
accommodate modern diversity)

[John Harshman]

No. Some of them do, and some of them don't.

> What happens when someone takes them
> to task for that?

Why, I suppose you get into an argument about definitions. As we are here.

> This is just the reality of the situation.

I suggest that your definition is bad because it doesn't distinguish the
DI "perps" from, apparently, you. What's the point in such a definition?

>>> That is just the way things are as long as there are people that will
>>> lie about being creationists in order to be like the Discovery
>>> Institute ID perps.
>>> I believe that Miller has said that he was a creationist,
>> Can you find an actual statement?
>
> Probably not. It may have been put up at the Panda's Thumb, but it
> could have been ARN or even here. It was probably at least 6 or 7
> years ago and may have been an older quote than that. I do recall
> that the quote included something like "I make no bones about the
> fact" so using that quote and Ken or Kenneth Miller might turn up
> something if the links are not broken.
>
> I tried it but you end up with a bunch of junk to wade through and
> Miller uses the expression quite often.

Permit me, then, to doubt your memory.

>>> just not the
>>> fundy type, probably some type of theistic evolutionist. I recall
>>> something where he said he made no bones about believing in a creator
>>> god. He obviously does not rule out the science and so he is likely
>>> the same as Collins with God in there somewhere.
>> So the question is whether it's useful to call such people creationists.
>> I suggest that it isn't, because the useful distinction is between
>> creationists and mainstream science. If you accept all of mainstream
>> science it just isn't useful to call you a creationist. We can still
>> make distinctions among creationists based on the particular tenets of
>> mainstream science they reject.
>
> My point is that the other option allows the dishonest to blow smoke.
> My option makes them admit that they are creationists and then defend
> themselves.

But if they admit it by your definition, we are no longer talking about
science, and we are no longer arguing about any differences between the
DI and Ken Miller. Congratulations, you have succeeded in making the
argument easy to make and simultaneously pointless.

> Nothing works that well against the dishonest.

If so, why bother worrying about the form of the argument?

> Look at
> how Nyikos has sidestepped the issue for over a year and keeps
> repeating that he isn't the fundy type of creationist.

He hasn't sidestepped it at all. He isn't a creationist at all, except
possibly by your definition, and he probably isn't by that one either
because he says he doesn't actually believe in a creator, just that he
would like to believe.

> He just
> doesn't answer the question. My way make the guys look as bogus as we
> all know that they are.

But only by confusing the definition of "creationist". They just refuse
to accept your definition. It isn't that they deny being creationists by
your definition.

> After we determine who is or isn't a
> creationists then the liars have to come up with some way to
> distinguish themselves from what they claim that they are not. Then
> they have to demonstrate that they are not Major's type of creationist
> while knowing that they are creationists. My definition just makes it
> easier to make it evident that they are lying. Nyikos is a case in
> point because he has had to manipulate posts and delete my definition
> of creationists in order to keep from admitting that he is a
> creationist. Honest people do not do bogus things like that. What is
> sad is that I admit to being a creationist so just being a creationist
> is not the issue. The issue is what type of creationist the person
> is, and Nyikos is the type that has lied about the ID scam and tried
> to defend the ID perps for over a year.

I suggest that your definition does nothing at all. You are fooling
yourself.

> SNIP:
>
>>>> In what way is Nyikos a creationist? He has never, as far as I know,
>>>> said he believes in a creator.
>>> Nyikos admitted that he was a Christian over a year ago.
>> Yes, but he's also a Christian agnostic: he agrees that the evidence for
>> God's existence is weak, but he's a Christian because he would like it
>> to be true. Nor is a Christian necessarily a creationist, unless we
>> adopt your position in which the term is synonymous with "theist".
>
> He hasn't claimed to be an agnostic, not to me.

He has to me.

> He just rambles on
> about less than 1% probability and "hope" instead of the usual
> "faith."

How is that not agnosticism?

> That isn't claiming to be an agnostic because religious
> belief isn't based on probability, and he can still believe in
> something no matter how low the probability is. He just keeps
> evading.

You keep being unable to understand his statements. That doesn't count
as evasion to me.

>>> He just
>>> claimed that he was unconventional in his beliefs. He has dodged
>>> stating where his creator fits in, but he just claimed last week that
>>> he will finally come clean next week. Don't ask me why he put it off
>>> for a week after dodging for a year. So we will see. If he does
>>> finally say I'll let you know. He has constantly dodged claiming that
>>> he isn't the fundy type of creationist,
>> Not true. In fact he has been exceedingly clear on the subject. Old
>> earth, common descent, natural processes. His only approach to
>> creationism is the fine-tuning argument. His version of ID for the
>> bacterial flagellum and such is purely and explicitly naturalistic. A
>> weird position but not creationism by any stretch, as he claims the
>> Designers evolved naturally.
>
> Where is his intelligent designer in the mix? He has been as clear as
> mud. How could you be deceived by what he claims? Is Behe a
> creationist? Yes. How is Nyikos different?

Behe believes that God is the designer of life. Peter believes that
aliens are the designers of life.

> Where do his aliens come
> from?

Presumably, you are asking how they came to be, not where they are.
According to him they arose through natural processes.

> Who created his immortal soul?

He doesn't know if he has one, so it's a moot question.

> Who created the universe?

He speculates that it might be God, but he doesn't know if anyone did.
Agnostic.

> Nyikos didn't spend a year defending the ID scam because he was not a
> creationist. He didn't start spouting Bible verses in his defense
> because he isn't a creationist. We will see next week if he makes
> good on his promise.

Sorry, but you're just not the most rational analyst of Peter's ideas.
This is one reason I generally ignore threads in which you both participate.

>>> but that is the same thing
>>> that a lot of the ID perps claim and Major's definition would define
>>> them as creationists, just not the fundy type of creationist. My
>>> definition is actually the standard definition and covers all
>>> creationists.
>> Standard in what sense? You seem to be the only person using it. Though
>> not quite. Some years ago at the North American SF convention (Worldcon
>> was somewhere else that year) there was a panel discussion organized
>> between creationists and "evolutionists". At the very outset it became
>> apparent that the so-called creationists were merely creationist in your
>> sense: they accepted all of mainstream science but thought that God had
>> been in some way involved. The panel was forced to adjourn because no
>> source for argument could be found.
>
> Standard as in terms of what is in the dictionary. There are a lot of
> definitions of creationist. Only one is the fundy type. The broad
> definition is the one I use.

And you can see that this definition can cause problems, as in my example.

> My Random House College dictionary (1975) just states that "The
> doctrine that God immediately creates out of nothing" and the single
> example given is a soul for each individual. It doesn't list the
> fundy definition of creationism. My Webster dictionary doesn't list
> creationism nor creationist. Jillery put up some web definitions that
> included my definition and the fundy definition. I haven't seen
> Major's definition listed anywhere, but I would agree that it is as
> good a definition of the type of creationist that we are concerned
> with as any.
>
>>> Once we get that far then you have to determine what
>>> type of creationist they are. I use the standard definition because
>>> it makes guys like Nyikos squirm.
>> In other words, you're being an asshole for the fun of it?
>
> No, because it doesn't allow them to be dishonest without having to
> understand how dishonest they are. If they were honest, they wouldn't
> have to squirm. Why let the jerks get away with blowing smoke as if
> they had an argument? You have to know that they are laughing at you
> as they lie to your face thinking that they are getting away with
> something with word games.

Sometimes I think you're as paranoid as Peter. Sometimes more so.

>>> I have no problem admitting that I
>>> am a creationist because I don't have anything to hide in that
>>> regard. The fundy definition doesn't apply to me and Major's
>>> definition doesn't apply to me because I am not that type of
>>> creationist. The fundy definition allows guys like the ID perps to
>>> lie to themselves about why they believe what they do.
>> Major's definition isn't the fundy one, you will note. And it does apply
>> to Behe.
>
> I have already stated that. That was part of my argument. Major
> would have to define what he meant as much as I would, but it is
> easier for them to deny what they are since Major's definition
> requires the elucidation of what their problem with science is when
> they can keep claiming not to be creationists. My way they have to
> admit to being creationists and then say why it doesn't matter. Just
> check out how the ID perps confuse and lie about the issue. Just
> check out how Nyikos is doing it in the By their fruits thread.

This advantage lies in your imagination only. If "creationist" is
synonymous with "theist", then all you do is get theists to admit
they're theists, which they are happy to do. Resistance is solely
because of the connotations of the word, due to the other definitions.
This isn't dishonesty. It's just refusal to accept your definition.

>>> You have to admit that guys like Behe and Dembski would deny that they
>>> were creationists if Major called them creationists.
>> Yet they fit his definition. Don't be too sure that Behe would deny it,
>> though. He has been forced to acknowledge several YEC beliefs in the
>> past few years, whether he really believes them or not.
>
> Major's definition does not rely on YEC beliefs.

And yet YEC beliefs clearly fit his definition.

> When guys like
> Dembski and Behe are called creationists they consistently deny that
> they are creationists and usually have some qualifiers about biblical
> literalist or scientific creationists in their denial when you know
> that, that doesn't matter.

I would be interested in seeing a denial by Dembski that he's a
creationist. Can you produce one?

> I would agree with Major about his definition being a good one for the
> faction of creationists that we are concerned with on TO. Kalk is the
> type of creationist that we are talking about by Major's definition
> and that is the way it should be.

Good. Then why bother with your useless definition?

>>> He would have to
>>> define what his definition was and what they do is repeat that they
>>> are not fundy types of creationists, run or change the subject. What
>>> do Behe and Dembski do when someone calls them a creationist? Isn't
>>> the fundy definition the basis of their denial? Does the fundy
>>> definition matter in their case as to their being creationists or
>>> not? Major would say no and so would I. I keep saying that these
>>> guys are not bogus because they are creationist, but because of what
>>> they do because they are creationists.
>> So what makes Peter a creationist other than the sense in which you are?
>> Why should we care if he's just like you?
>
> Well he claims to be a Christian, and I haven't met one that isn't a
> creationist. Who made Peter being just like me an issue? Did I miss
> something somewhere? Isn't it what Peter is that matters? Peter is
> supposed to say next week, and I will let you know about what he
> claims.

If you're a creationist, that just makes the term useless.

[Mark Isaak]

On 3/4/12 12:15 PM, Robert Carnegie: Fnord: cc

talk-o...@moderators.isc.org wrote:
> On Sunday, March 4, 2012 6:39:43 PM UTC, TomS wrote:

>> [...] Some ID advocates even accept the

>> common ancestry of humans with other primates.
>
> Then they aren't creationists - unless they assert
> that God made the primates, of course. Or the
> bananas that the primates eat, etc. On the other
> hand, I insist on detaching Noah's Ark from
> creationism. What creationism is about is the

> creating, and the no evolution.

Most flood myths are creation myths, and Noah is no exception. Though
its creation features are not as obvious as remaking the landscape or
the life on it, it still tells part of the story of how man came to his
present state in the world. In particular, the story includes the
beginning of meat eating and viticulture, God's making the first
covenant with man, and a hint at the defeat of prior monsters. Folk
belief around it does sometimes include remaking the landscape, remaking
the climate, and causing various extinctions. The creation account in
Genesis really ends with the Tower of Babel episode.

Of course, not all creationism is biblical, including stealth
creationism, so creationism does not necessarily include Noah. But
talking of Noah does put you in the subject of creationism.

--
Mark Isaak eciton (at) curioustaxonomy (dot) net
"It is certain, from experience, that the smallest grain of natural
honesty and benevolence has more effect on men's conduct, than the most
pompous views suggested by theological theories and systems." - D. Hume

[Robert Carnegie: Fnord: cc talk-origins@moderators.isc.org]

On Monday, March 5, 2012 6:41:31 AM UTC, Mark Isaak wrote:
> On 3/4/12 12:15 PM, Robert Carnegie: Fnord: cc
> talk-o...@moderators.isc.org wrote:
> > On Sunday, March 4, 2012 6:39:43 PM UTC, TomS wrote:
> >> [...] Some ID advocates even accept the
> >> common ancestry of humans with other primates.
> >
> > Then they aren't creationists - unless they assert
> > that God made the primates, of course. Or the
> > bananas that the primates eat, etc. On the other
> > hand, I insist on detaching Noah's Ark from
> > creationism. What creationism is about is the
> > creating, and the no evolution.
>
> Most flood myths are creation myths, and Noah is no exception. Though
> its creation features are not as obvious as remaking the landscape or
> the life on it, it still tells part of the story of how man came to his
> present state in the world. In particular, the story includes the
> beginning of meat eating and viticulture, God's making the first
> covenant with man, and a hint at the defeat of prior monsters. Folk
> belief around it does sometimes include remaking the landscape, remaking
> the climate, and causing various extinctions. The creation account in
> Genesis really ends with the Tower of Babel episode.
>
> Of course, not all creationism is biblical, including stealth
> creationism, so creationism does not necessarily include Noah. But
> talking of Noah does put you in the subject of creationism.

I know you've thought about this, but
you seem now to be treating "creation myth"
and "creationism" as synonymous terms.
I do not want to do that. Creationism,
I say, is a doctrine of living things being
created, in kinds, and in Noah's story,
the animals aren't created; they walk into
the Ark from the outside world, and they
walk out again at the end of the story,
except for the ones that Noah keeps back
for a big bloody sacrifice to God.
Oh, and the remaining birds (they fly)
and the snakes (crawl).

That the world as we know it was "created"
by some process, whether as an act of God or
otherwise, is almost demanded by the facts
that the world exists and time passes, so
there isn't much value in debating that -
or in naming it as "creationism".

Alternatives include that the world has
always existed in an infinitely long past -
which is an odd idea - or that the passing
of time has an origin and that that
disqualifies the beginning of the history
of the world from being "creation", which
is also odd but also describes "Big Bang"
cosmology, I think. And anyway, isn't it
equally odd for time itself to have an
infinitely long past?

[Ron O]

On Mar 5, 5:57 am, "Robert Carnegie: Fnord: cc talk-

orig...@moderators.isc.org" <rja.carne...@excite.com> wrote:
> On Monday, March 5, 2012 6:41:31 AM UTC, Mark Isaak wrote:
> > On 3/4/12 12:15 PM, Robert Carnegie: Fnord: cc

The world wide flood was one of the main tenets of scientific
creationism and was written into the Arkansas creation science bill.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McLean_v._Arkansas
QUOTE:
"Creation science means the scientific evidences for creation and
inferences from those evidences. Creation science includes the
scientific evidences and related inferences that indicate:

Sudden creation of the universe, energy and life from nothing.
The insufficiency of mutation and natural selection in
bringing about development of all living kinds from a single organism.
Changes only with fixed limits of originally created kinds of
plants and animals.
Separate ancestry for man and apes.
Explanation of the earth's geology by catastrophism, including
the occurrence of worldwide flood.
A relatively recent inception of the earth and living
END QUOTE:

Ron Okimoto

[TomS]

"On Mon, 05 Mar 2012 12:42:48 +1100, in article <jj15ng$qld$1...@dont-email.me>,
John Wilkins stated..."

>
>On 5/03/12 7:15 AM, Robert Carnegie: Fnord: cc
>talk-o...@moderators.isc.org wrote:
>> On Sunday, March 4, 2012 6:39:43 PM UTC, TomS wrote:
>>> "On Sun, 4 Mar 2012 09:25:15 -0800 (PST), in article
>>> <a77180ac-8260-4449...@a15g2000yqf.googlegroups.com>, Ron O
>>> stated..."
>>> [...snip...]
>>>> My Random House College dictionary (1975) just states that "The
>>>> doctrine that God immediately creates out of nothing" and the single
>>>> example given is a soul for each individual. It doesn't list the
>>>> fundy definition of creationism.
>>> [...snip...]
>>>
>>> The old (I'm talking about pre-darwin times) meaning of
>>> "creationism" related to ideas about the origins of souls.
>>> Creationists believed that a soul was created separately, at
>>> the beginning of life, for each individual. There were others
>>> who believed that souls pre-existed the body, and those who
>>> believed that souls were inherited.
>>
>> But, as you say, that's an old meaning of
>> "creationism", not currently correct. I assume
>> that it covers what we understand to be the
>> current Catholic doctrine about souls.

I only mentioned this because it could be relevant to the example.

>>
>>> One of the problems with defining "creationism" in the
>>> contemporary use of the word is that it covers a wide range of
>>> beliefs, including Young Earth-Noah's Ark and various versions
>>> of Old Earth; while Intelligent Design is deliberately silent
>>> on just about everything. Some ID advocates even accept the
>>> common ancestry of humans with other primates.
>>
>> Then they aren't creationists - unless they assert
>> that God made the primates, of course. Or the

Doesn't Behe accept common ancestry?

>> bananas that the primates eat, etc. On the other
>> hand, I insist on detaching Noah's Ark from
>> creationism. What creationism is about is the
>> creating, and the no evolution.
>>
>
>I think we need some unique terms:
>
>Creatorism: the view that God created the world and is distinct from it
>(aka theism)
>
>Creationism: the view that things as they are now were made by God
>sometime in the past

Is there some reason that you have used the verb "made" here while
elsewhere using "created"? One can make a case that there is a major
difference between creating and making (or designing).

>
>Ancient creationism: the view that God created the world as it is now
>(more or less) a long time ago
>
>Recent creationism: the view that God created the world as it is now
>(more or less) only a few thousand years ago
>
>Arkism: the view that there were only so many kinds as could fit on the
>Ark a few thousand years ago (leading to hyperevolutionism to
>accommodate modern diversity)
>

Pithecophobia: we aren't related to (such as by having common ancestry
with) chimps and other apes

What we really need is a word that distinguishes all varieties of
the denial of evolutionary biology for irrational reasons. I think
that "pithecophobia" covers the great majority of varieties which
are of interest to us. But I don't suggest using it.

[Robert Carnegie: Fnord: cc talk-origins@moderators.isc.org]

I wrote most of a longer reply which stupid
New Google Groups has eaten and won't give
me back.

There are two reasons for The Flood to be
in there that don't make it creationism:
they are really trying to teach all of the
bible in public schools, and also the
geological evidence convincingly refutes
creationism, so they have to just pretend
that it doesn't.

Having said that, "scientific creationism"
and "creation science" need not be limited
to creationism, any more than "oxidation"
is limited to chemical reactions involving
oxygen. (You probably knew that it isn't.)

For instance, what does creation science
say about race?

An antagonistic view is presented at
<http://www.skepticreport.com/sr/?p=474>
"Scientific creationists, however, have a
simple, Scriptural explanation for human
diversity. All people today are descendants
of the sons of Noah."

But here is what some creationists say:
<http://www.creationtoday.org/where-did-the-races-come-from/>
"Some have tried to say that Cain became
the first black man. Of course, that theory
only explains two colors and does not
consider the Flood bringing the human race
back to one family. [...] Some people think
Canaan became the first black man. [...]
The most likely theory says the races came
from the Tower of Babel. Genesis 10:20 says,
"These are the sons of Ham, after their
families, after their tongues, in their
countries, and in their nations." Perhaps
all families, countries, nations, and tongues
were created or developed from this event.
Maybe the colors were divinely created at
that time, or maybe they are just a natural
product of a small group of people speaking
their own language and marrying back to their
own parent stock. Racial traits become more pronounced in a small inbreeding group."
Psst: natural evolution, post-Babel. Ssh!

Likewise
<http://www.creationscience.com/onlinebook/FAQ312.html>
"Imagine a barrel filled with marbles -
half white and half black. Let's say that
each marble represents a person, and the
marble's color represents a gene for that
person's skin color. If pairs of marbles,
representing a husband and wife, are drawn
at random and placed on separate islands,
about half the islands will have marbles
of just one color—white or black. This
would be somewhat analogous to the
dispersion and isolation of peoples after
the flood and after Babel."

Regardless, race has nothing to do with
the creation of human beings, but here are
creation science's opinions.

By the way, each side of the dispute paints
the others as racists. You knew that, too.

[Burkhard]

On Mar 5, 2:24 pm, "Robert Carnegie: Fnord: cc talk-

Fascinating! Gives a totally new meaning to the term "blue language".
Apparently, the language you speak can change the pigmentation of your
skin

Burkhard

[John S. Wilkins]

TomS <TomS_...@newsguy.com> wrote:

> "On Mon, 05 Mar 2012 12:42:48 +1100, in article <jj15ng$qld$1...@dont-email.me>,
> John Wilkins stated..."
> >

...

> >I think we need some unique terms:
> >
> >Creatorism: the view that God created the world and is distinct from it
> >(aka theism)
> >
> >Creationism: the view that things as they are now were made by God
> >sometime in the past
>
> Is there some reason that you have used the verb "made" here while
> elsewhere using "created"? One can make a case that there is a major
> difference between creating and making (or designing).

Well not really, but it is a point. God might have made living things
(say, from mud or chaos) without being a designer of everything.

>
> >
> >Ancient creationism: the view that God created the world as it is now
> >(more or less) a long time ago
> >
> >Recent creationism: the view that God created the world as it is now
> >(more or less) only a few thousand years ago
> >
> >Arkism: the view that there were only so many kinds as could fit on the
> >Ark a few thousand years ago (leading to hyperevolutionism to
> >accommodate modern diversity)
> >
>
> Pithecophobia: we aren't related to (such as by having common ancestry
> with) chimps and other apes
>
> What we really need is a word that distinguishes all varieties of
> the denial of evolutionary biology for irrational reasons. I think
> that "pithecophobia" covers the great majority of varieties which
> are of interest to us. But I don't suggest using it.


--

John S. Wilkins, Associate, Philosophy, University of Sydney
http://evolvingthoughts.net
But al be that he was a philosophre,
Yet hadde he but litel gold in cofre

[Mark Isaak]

On 3/5/12 3:57 AM, Robert Carnegie: Fnord: cc

Pretty much, but see below.

> I do not want to do that. Creationism,
> I say, is a doctrine of living things being
> created, in kinds, and in Noah's story,
> the animals aren't created; they walk into
> the Ark from the outside world, and they
> walk out again at the end of the story,
> except for the ones that Noah keeps back
> for a big bloody sacrifice to God.
> Oh, and the remaining birds (they fly)
> and the snakes (crawl).

I guess it's time for my entry in the "Define Creationism" sweepstakes.

Creationism is a belief in a social group's set of creation myths. So
creationism is not the same as creation myths, but it is inseparable
from them.

A creation myth, as I noted earlier, is a myth (a sacred story) that
relates important details of how the world came to be ordered as it is.
Such myths often concern the origin of the world and of people, but
they are not limited to that; many also concern the origins of laws and
customs, of hardship and death, of important food or other natural
resources, etc.

Some forms of creationism (I believe Hopi is one, as well as African
groups whose names I don't remember) say nothing about the creation of
people, because their origin-of-people myth deals with people emerging
from underground. Someone who adheres to such a myth I would still call
a creationist.

Even if you reserve "creationism", among biblical creationists, for the
origin of earth and life, I think you will find, in practice, that Noah
is part of the package. Even if the creationists themselves think of
them as different episodes, they are still part of the same set, and the
set is bound up in a single unit.

[Robert Carnegie: Fnord: cc talk-origins@moderators.isc.org]

On Monday, March 5, 2012 9:05:29 PM UTC, Mark Isaak wrote:
> I guess it's time for my entry in the "Define Creationism" sweepstakes.
>
> Creationism is a belief in a social group's set of creation myths. So
> creationism is not the same as creation myths, but it is inseparable
> from them.
>
> A creation myth, as I noted earlier, is a myth (a sacred story) that
> relates important details of how the world came to be ordered as it is.
> Such myths often concern the origin of the world and of people, but
> they are not limited to that; many also concern the origins of laws and
> customs, of hardship and death, of important food or other natural
> resources, etc.
>
> Some forms of creationism (I believe Hopi is one, as well as African
> groups whose names I don't remember) say nothing about the creation of
> people, because their origin-of-people myth deals with people emerging
> from underground. Someone who adheres to such a myth I would still call
> a creationist.

But isn't that everybody, then?

Doesn't that imply that natural selection is
the creation myth of biologists and atheists?
And the Big Bang likewise.

I was told that my house was built in 1994:
does that make me a creationist? I don't have
the scriptures handy, they're under lock and key.

> Even if you reserve "creationism", among biblical creationists, for the
> origin of earth and life, I think you will find, in practice, that Noah
> is part of the package. Even if the creationists themselves think of
> them as different episodes, they are still part of the same set, and the
> set is bound up in a single unit.

Noah as h《tory: YEC I suspect yes, OEC
(if any remain) I would suppose not. But
I haven't taken a poll.

[pnyikos]

On Mar 4, 8:47 pm, John Harshman <jharsh...@pacbell.net> wrote:
> Ron O wrote:
> > On Mar 4, 9:44 am, John Harshman <jharsh...@pacbell.net> wrote:

> >> Unless you're Humpty Dumpty, however, you can't just enforce your
> >> personal meaning on everyone. This definition thing has a social
> >> component. Communication is in theory the goal, so we should come to
> >> some agreement.
>
> > Major's definition isn't the usual definition either.  You are just
> > restating the facts.  There are different ways of dealing with the
> > situation.  You can stick with the usual fundy definition that is used
> > on TO (not a good option for the dishonest IDiots and ID perps).  You
> > can go with my option or something like Major's option.  Both options
> > require definition of what is a creationist.  My option the IDiots
> > can't deny that they are creationists,

I can and do. Jillery posted three different definitions of
creationism, encompassing Ron O's own definition, and I have explained
in great detail why I do not fit any of them, beginning with the
following direct reply to jillery's original post.

http://groups.google.com/group/talk.origins/msg/c9f43cd62c28b2bd

[...]

> > Look at
> > how Nyikos has sidestepped the issue for over a year and keeps
> > repeating that he isn't the fundy type of creationist.

I haven't said that in a long time. What I HAVE done is to make it
clear that I am not a Ron O type of creationist.

Ron O is deeply in denial about that. He asked me three questions in
order to try and catch me up, and when I answered his first two in a
way that couldn't be interpreted as endorsing even his variety of
creationism he became so enraged that that he told a bare-faced lie,
alleging that I dodged his second question, the question of where my
(panspermist) aliens come from. I proved the lie many times over in
the following post:

http://groups.google.com/group/talk.origins/msg/9b60301ea800e4fe

Here you can still see jillery's definitions and my response,
amplified in each succeeding post.

Ron O wrote a thoroughly mendacious reply to that, pretending that he
hadn't lied because I had "dishonestly manipulated" his post by
deleting his third question. Actually I had immediately offered to
answer it if jillery requested I do so; I couldn't see its relevance
to the issue of whether I am a creationist because it was about
whether I believe we have souls.

But I'll answer it here and now. It is a corollary of things I have
told you that I estimate the probability at < 1% that we have souls in
the way traditional Christianity views souls to be. Many other kinds
don't seem to require a creator; the ancient Greeks generally didn't
believe in a creator of the universe AFAIK, but they did have a very
grim view of the afterlife, with souls inhabiting a shadowy realm
called Hades and having a most joyless existence there. Sooner
Epicurus's cheerful "death is oblivion" philosophy than an etermity
like that.

> because he says he doesn't actually believe in a creator, just that he
> would like to believe.

Exactly. And you might recall that I turned Unamuno on his head a
couple of months ago, saying "If there is no God, of what use is an
afterlife?"

> > He just
> > doesn't answer the question.

That is one of the most shameless lies I have ever seen anyone tell.
Those two posts up there are just scratch the surface of what a lie
Ron O is telling here. I have been saying off and on for over a year
now that I am not a creationist by Ron O's definition, and I have
known about that definition ever since about a week after I re-joined
talk.origins in 2010 after almost a decade's absence.

> > My way make the guys look as bogus as we
> > all know that they are.
>
> But only by confusing the definition of "creationist".

Not even that way. What Ron O has done is set a clumsy trap for
himself and walk into it. The result is that he is exposed as the
bogus one, not I.

>They just refuse
> to accept your definition. It isn't that they deny being creationists by
> your definition.

Ah, but I do deny it.

> >  Nyikos is a case in
> > point because he has had to manipulate posts and delete my definition
> > of creationists
> > in order to keep from admitting that he is a
> > creationist.

Another lie.

I believe Ron O is referring to my deleting his list of various kinds
of religions which fit his definition. Irrelevant, since I don't fit
it.

> >  Honest people do not do bogus things like that.  What is
> > sad is that I admit to being a creationist so just being a creationist
> > is not the issue.

What is even sadder is that all the time Ron O was puking all over me
for deleting his third question, he ducked one question after another
about what kind of creationist HE is. He made a feeble attempt to
cloud the issue by saying he believed that he agreed with the standard
Methodist idea. But then he admitted on cross examination that there
IS no standard Methodist idea, and then he puked all over me for
pointing out his admission.

> > The issue is what type of creationist the person
> > is, and Nyikos is the type that has lied about the ID scam

Like I said on another thread, hell hath no fury like Ron O when his
pet interpretation of a certain DI quote is scorned.

That is what my "lied about the ID scam" is all about. I have posted
thousands of lines and even set up a "Scottish verdict" thread to try
and get Ron O to give better evidence than that one quote that the DI
is claiming to have the ID science in a form suitable for teaching at
the public school level as a serious rival to the neo-Darwinist
synthesis.

In over a year all he has been able to come up with is another quote
to the same general effect, and a long-obsolete claim, long predating
Dover, by one or two of the DI people that the science was ready for
teaching.

> >and tried
> > to defend the ID perps for over a year.

Asking for strong evidence that the DI people are doing what Ron O
claims is his idea of "defending the ID perps."

> I suggest that your definition does nothing at all. You are fooling
> yourself.

Truer words were never spoken. And now you know just how true they
are.

Continued in my next reply.

Peter Nyikos

[pnyikos]

On Mar 4, 8:47 pm, John Harshman <jharsh...@pacbell.net> wrote:
> Ron O wrote:
> > On Mar 4, 9:44 am, John Harshman <jharsh...@pacbell.net> wrote:
> >> Ron O wrote:
> >>> On Mar 3, 8:24 pm, John Harshman <jharsh...@pacbell.net> wrote:

> >>>> In what way is Nyikos a creationist? He has never, as far as I know,
> >>>> said he believes in a creator.

And indeed, I have never said that on Usenet. I value honesty and
sincerity here far too highly for that.

In everyday life, off the Internet, I sometimes have to make a mental
reservation to avoid making a scene, and I say that I "believe in"
God, and Jesus Christ, etc. but I mean it in the sense that "If the
Christian religion is true, then I trust God and Jesus to do what is
best for us."

But I dislike making mental reservations, and I avoid them like the
plague when I post to the Internet.

> >>> Nyikos admitted that he was a Christian over a year ago.
> >> Yes, but he's also a Christian agnostic: he agrees that the evidence for
> >> God's existence is weak, but he's a Christian because he would like it
> >> to be true. Nor is a Christian necessarily a creationist, unless we
> >> adopt your position in which the term is synonymous with "theist".
>
> > He hasn't claimed to be an agnostic, not to me.
>
> He has to me.
>
> > He just rambles on
> > about less than 1% probability and "hope" instead of the usual
> > "faith."
>
> How is that not agnosticism?

> > That isn't claiming to be an agnostic because religious
> > belief isn't based on probability, and he can still believe in
> > something no matter how low the probability is.

Only in the mental reservation sense above. I am far too much of a
realist to mean it any other way.

> > He just keeps
> > evading.
>
> You keep being unable to understand his statements. That doesn't count
> as evasion to me.

"As true as taxes. And there's nothing truer than them." -- Barkis in
_David Copperfield_.

> >>> He just
> >>> claimed that he was unconventional in his beliefs.  He has dodged
> >>> stating where his creator fits in,

Note the fallacy of begging the question: "his creator." Ron O is
projecting big-time here: he has dodged every effort to get him to
state ANYTHING valid about where his creator fits in.

> >>>but he just claimed last week that
> >>> he will finally come clean next week.

...about the human soul, if there is one. I came clean in my previous
reply to this post of yours, John.

And the "finally" refers to an issue that was put to me the very first
time about the middle of last month!

And I would have replied immediately if jillery had asked me to. But
jillery wants Ron O to emerge victorious, so getting me to answer the
question was the furthest thing from her/his mind.

> >>>  Don't ask me why he put it off
> >>> for a week after dodging for a year.

I only dodged it for about two weeks.

> >>> So we will see.  If he does
> >>> finally say I'll let you know.  He has constantly dodged claiming that
> >>> he isn't the fundy type of creationist,
> >> Not true. In fact he has been exceedingly clear on the subject. Old
> >> earth, common descent, natural processes. His only approach to
> >> creationism is the fine-tuning argument. His version of ID for the
> >> bacterial flagellum and such is purely and explicitly naturalistic. A
> >> weird position but not creationism by any stretch, as he claims the
> >> Designers evolved naturally.
>
> > Where is his intelligent designer in the mix?  He has been as clear as
> > mud.  How could you be deceived by what he claims?  Is Behe a
> > creationist?  Yes.  How is Nyikos different?
>
> Behe believes that God is the designer of life. Peter believes that
> aliens are the designers of life.
>
> > Where do his aliens come
> > from?
>
> Presumably, you are asking how they came to be, not where they are.

I presumed that too, the first time around. Then he falsely accused
me of dodging the question, so I also answered about some hypotheses I
had as to their whereabouts. It became clear from his repeated "So
what"s that he had lied the first time.

In my previous reply to this post of yours, I gave you the url where
you can see all this played out in great detail.

> According to him they arose through natural processes.
>
> > Who created his immortal soul?
>
> He doesn't know if he has one, so it's a moot question.

Well put.

> > Who created the universe?
>
> He speculates that it might be God, but he doesn't know if anyone did.

In fact, I place about as great a probability on it as Dawkins
recently did in an interview.

> Agnostic.

I thought Dawkins was a militant atheist, but now it appears he is an
agnostic. But I think it is safe to say that his hopes are almost
diametrically opposite mine.

> > Nyikos didn't spend a year defending the ID scam because he was not a
> > creationist.  He didn't start spouting Bible verses in his defense
> > because he isn't a creationist.

I quoted from the Bible, just as I quoted from _David Copperfield_
above, when it seemed to express best the thoughts I had. There was
no defense of anything involved.

Ron O seems to have no idea that the Bible contains some of the best
literature in the world (as well as a bit of the worst, but that's
neither here nor there).

[...]

> >>Some years ago at the North American SF convention (Worldcon
> >> was somewhere else that year) there was a panel discussion organized
> >> between creationists and "evolutionists". At the very outset it became
> >> apparent that the so-called creationists were merely creationist in your
> >> sense: they accepted all of mainstream science but thought that God had
> >> been in some way involved. The panel was forced to adjourn because no
> >> source for argument could be found.
>
> > Standard as in terms of what is in the dictionary.

And jillery quoted from the dictionary to back Ron O up on that, and I
responded as I told you in my previous reply to this post of yours.

> > My Random House College dictionary (1975) just states that "The
> > doctrine that God immediately creates out of nothing" and the single
> > example given is a soul for each individual.

That is the traditional Roman Catholic doctrine; one I would like to
be true, along with all the promises of a glorious life after death in
the NT, but I fear it may all be a pipe dream.

And here Ron O tells about what jillery did, conveniently omitting
what I did, because that would expose him as a shameless liar:

> >Jillery put up some web definitions that
> > included my definition and the fundy definition.

> >>>  I use the standard definition because
> >>> it makes guys like Nyikos squirm.

Besides being a liar, Ron O is seriously deluded. I enjoyed meeting
his definition head-on, time and time again.

> >> In other words, you're being an asshole for the fun of it?

That's putting it more kindly than Ron O deserves.

[...]

> >>> I have no problem admitting that I
> >>> am a creationist because I don't have anything to hide in that
> >>> regard.

Actually he hides everything except the "fact" that he believes in a
creator, and sometimes I think he lies about that because it makes it
easier for him to lie about me, and perhaps about others.

Peter Nyikos

[pnyikos]

On Mar 4, 5:18 am, "Robert Carnegie: Fnord: cc talk-

More precisely, true theistic evolution, as opposed to the neo-deistic
evolution that goes by the inaccurate name "theistic evolution".

I don't think self-styled "theistic evolutionists" like Ken Miller
would have any truck with the words of Loren Eiseley:

``Perhaps there also, among rotting fish heads and blue,
night-burning bog lights, moved the eternal mystery,
the careful finger of God. The increase was not much.
It was two bubbles, two thin-walled little balloons at the
end of the Snout's small brain. The cerebral hemispheres
had appeared.''
--_The Immense Journey_

Peter Nyikos

[pnyikos]

On Mar 3, 9:48 am, John Harshman <jharsh...@pacbell.net> wrote:
> pnyikos wrote:
> > On Mar 2, 9:33 pm, John Harshman <jharsh...@pacbell.net> wrote:
> >> pnyikos wrote:
> >>> The following excerpt is a lot more revealing than all the hooha:
> >>> _____________________________________________
> >>> A representative from Springer told Kaustuv Basu, a reporter for
> >>> Inside Higher Ed, that the company had decided to submit the
> >>> manuscript for additional peer review.
> >>> None of the critics have read the book. Their criticism is based upon
> >>> their knowledge of the authors and their ideas.

It now appears that none of the critics, including Nick Matzke [who
may be responsible for all the brouhaha] knew who the authors were.
Nick knew who the editors were, and wrongly conjectured that Sid
Galloway was an author, as well as conjecturing that John Sanford was
one[whether correctly or incorrectly, I do not know] in addition to
being an editor. This was in the following article in the Panda's
Thumb site:

http://pandasthumb.org/archives/2012/02/springer-gets-s.html

Later, someone found out that Jorge Fernandez, who is alleged to be a
YEC, was one of the authors.

But now, in the comments people have been posting to an updated
article, the list of authors is beginning to emerge.

http://pandasthumb.org/archives/2012/02/update-on-sprin.html

Here are the ones identified so far, with # in front of their names,
each followed by either the person who documented it or the
documentation.

#John W. Oller
A Masked Panda (F10Q) | March 1, 2012 1:27 PM
#Werner Gitt:
http://cjandhj.blogspot.com/2011/06/trip-to-state-college-and-ithaca-ny.html
#Wesley Brewer:
A Masked Panda (F10Q) | March 1, 2012 12:58 PM
#Winston Ewert and George Montanez:
afarensis | March 1, 2012 1:44 PM |

Strangely enough, the usual gossip about them being creationists is
missing.

> >>> ___________________
> >>> Douglas Theobald, assistant professor of biochemistry at Brandeis
> >>> University, said he believed that "Springer has been duped and that
> >>> the senior editors are unaware that this is a quack group of anti-
> >>> evolution creationists."
> >>> =============================
> >>> I wonder whether he knows the names of the authors.

He didn't. Here is a quote from a more detailed article:

___________________________________
Theobald said that neither he nor his colleagues have read the book,
but did have an idea of the content because of the blurb and the names
of the editors. He called the book another effort “in a long sordid
history here of trying to get pseudoscientific, anti-evolution papers
published in journals to raise the respectability of ID with non-
scientists”

http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2012/03/01/book-intelligent-design-proponents-upsets-scientists#ixzz1oIz1h0QD
Inside Higher Ed
==============================

> >> I'm always amazed at how skeptical you are of anything said by any
> >> critic of creationists,
>
> > You are a critic of creationists.
>
> And, oddly enough, so are you. But you seem quite credulous of anything
> that is given the ID label instead of the creationist label.

I don't see why you think that.

> > ++++++++++++++++++++ saracsm on
>
> > Are you always amazed at how skeptical I am of anything said by you?
>
> Not always.
>
> > ++++++++++++++++++++ saracsm off
>
> > In case anyone missed the point of the sarcasm: I am often grateful
> > for information John posts on paleontology.  He just misspoke up
> > there.
>
> Only if you're a mathematician and think that a single counterexample
> disproves a theorem.

I see you are so much of a non-mathematician that "often grateful"
gets equated to "single counterexample."

> It isn't paleontology we're talking about here.

I took you literally.

> It's the ID industry. And you are quite sceptical of almost all I say
> about that.

Only when your evidence is very scanty. As here.


> >> as long as there's the least little ID beard
> >> provided.
>
> > What least little ID beard?  So far, what I've seen is the least
> > little creationist beard (Sandford's), despite an enormous amount of
> > smoke on the Panda's Thumb blog.
>
> Perhaps you are unacquainted with the term "beard" as used here? Most ID
> is creationism, lightly disguised.

Most ID can be dovetailed with creationism, and that's a different
matter altogether. [Mine cannot.]

> The presence of Sanford is the
> non-beard part.

So you claim. But as far as authors go, who belongs to the beard part
and who does not?

> >http://pandasthumb.org/archives/2012/02/springer-gets-s.html#comment-...
>
> >> A little digging would have found you quite a bit more
> >> information.
>
> > Looks like I did a little more digging than you did,
>
> What makes you think I didn't?

Because you didn't name a single other editor, while I identified all
of them last time, and neither time did you identify a single author.
Yet the information was available two days before this latest post of
yours, and a day before the previous one.

Concluded in my next post.

Peter Nyikos

[pnyikos]

On Mar 3, 9:48 am, John Harshman <jharsh...@pacbell.net> wrote:
> pnyikos wrote:

> > I found
> > the names of the other editors on that Panda's Thumb blog:
>
> > Marks II, R.J.; Behe, M.J.; Dembski, W.A.; Gordon, B.L.;
>
> > I know the middle two aren't creationists in the usual t.o. senses;
> > what about the other two?
>
> Who says Dembski isn't a creationist? He accepts a recent, worldwide
> flood.

I thought you retracted that claim a while back. Anyway, that's not
necessarily indicative of creationism.

> He appears to doubt that humans are related to other apes. He
> believes in a literal Adam and Eve.

In what sense? That God molded Adam from the dust of the earth?

> Marks is a creationist. I don't know
> Gordon.
>
> >> These are the proceedings of an invitation-only creationist
> >> conference.
>
> > Reference?

You gave none. And you have no evidence yet that the papers or talks
were on creationism. In fact, participants were told to be scrupulous
about trying to be scientific and not let any religious beliefs leak
into their talks.

[...]

> > you certainly don't think of me as a
> > creationist, despite my opinion that life on earth is the result of
> > seeding by panspermists who probably did extensive ID on the
> > prokaryotes (and possibly primitive eukaryotes) that they sent.
>
> That's your opinion? I thought it was your tentative hypothesis.

When I put on my scientist's hat, I call it a hypothesis, and there's
nothing tentative about it.

But it is my opinion as well. I could be wrong, of course.

> Are you
> actually now saying you think it's true? On what basis?

I've given the basis many times. I don't think this is the best place
to rehash it.

But here's a clue. I've posted on the first Panda's Thumb website I
gave above, giving an outline. It is on Comments 99 and 100, and they
are only up to 102, so they should be easy to find.

[...]
> >> Sanford has written a book arguing that all species are in a
> >> downward genetic spiral, and so the world must be only 6000 years old.
>
> > That 6000 figure is you editorializing, just like Elizabeth Liddle did
> > with her 10,000 figure. I linked to another blog using something she
> > wrote on that Panda's Thumb site, and I read a good bit of back-and-
> > forth between her and "Mung" and it seems she was just estimating from
> > a prediction by Sanford of humanity's future:
> >http://www.uncommondescent.com/evolution/new-paper-using-the-avida-ev...
>
> > By the way, Sanford posted their correspondence in his blog at her
> > request, and she thanked him for it. See message number 59.

Oops, he gave her permission to post it on another ID blog.

[...]

> >> Some but not all of the authors
> >> are known.
>
> > But you don't know the identity of a single one, eh? Neither do I,
> > although I thought the Panda's Thumb people would know.
>
> We know some of the participants in the meeting.
> It's a proceedings
> volume. It contains papers presented at the meeting. Therefore we know
> some of the authors.

Now we do. If you knew earlier, why didn't you list any?

Peter Nyikos

[Tim Norfolk]

On Mar 3, 9:48 am, John Harshman <jharsh...@pacbell.net> wrote:

<snip>

> Only if you're a mathematician and think that a single counterexample
> disproves a theorem.

<snip>

A single counterexample does disprove a theorem. That's just the way
it works.

[John Harshman]

pnyikos wrote:
> On Mar 3, 9:48 am, John Harshman <jharsh...@pacbell.net> wrote:
>> pnyikos wrote:
>
>>> I found
>>> the names of the other editors on that Panda's Thumb blog:
>>> Marks II, R.J.; Behe, M.J.; Dembski, W.A.; Gordon, B.L.;
>>> I know the middle two aren't creationists in the usual t.o. senses;
>>> what about the other two?
>> Who says Dembski isn't a creationist? He accepts a recent, worldwide
>> flood.
>
> I thought you retracted that claim a while back. Anyway, that's not
> necessarily indicative of creationism.

That's more of your special pleading. But go ahead and present an
argument that belief in the flood of Noah doesn't make you a creationist.

>> He appears to doubt that humans are related to other apes. He
>> believes in a literal Adam and Eve.
>
> In what sense? That God molded Adam from the dust of the earth?

Again, what sense would make him other than a creationist? What do you
mean when you say "creationist"?

>> Marks is a creationist. I don't know
>> Gordon.
>>
>>>> These are the proceedings of an invitation-only creationist
>>>> conference.
>>> Reference?
>
> You gave none. And you have no evidence yet that the papers or talks
> were on creationism. In fact, participants were told to be scrupulous
> about trying to be scientific and not let any religious beliefs leak
> into their talks.

Come on, now. What sort of meeting has to tell participants that? You
are bending over backwards here, and it must be very uncomfortable for you.

>>> you certainly don't think of me as a
>>> creationist, despite my opinion that life on earth is the result of
>>> seeding by panspermists who probably did extensive ID on the
>>> prokaryotes (and possibly primitive eukaryotes) that they sent.
>> That's your opinion? I thought it was your tentative hypothesis.
>
> When I put on my scientist's hat, I call it a hypothesis, and there's
> nothing tentative about it.
>
> But it is my opinion as well. I could be wrong, of course.

I'm not sure you have a scientist's hat. At any rate, if I go ask
Francis Collins to give you some research money, his first question is
not going to be "Does he have his own hat?" You have presented no
rational argument or evidence in favor of your hypothesis.

>> Are you
>> actually now saying you think it's true? On what basis?
>
> I've given the basis many times. I don't think this is the best place
> to rehash it.

I don't know. Every time I try to engage you seriously, you stop posting
before we get into it.

> But here's a clue. I've posted on the first Panda's Thumb website I
> gave above, giving an outline. It is on Comments 99 and 100, and they
> are only up to 102, so they should be easy to find.

Thanks. But you didn't give a Panda's Thumb website above. Which thread
are you referring to? Never mind, I finally found it. But I didn't find
any argument or evidence there. There were some odd statements about
bacterial flagella, but they didn't seem to assemble (self-assemble?)
into any sort of argument or evidence.

>>>> Sanford has written a book arguing that all species are in a
>>>> downward genetic spiral, and so the world must be only 6000 years old.
>>> That 6000 figure is you editorializing, just like Elizabeth Liddle did
>>> with her 10,000 figure. I linked to another blog using something she
>>> wrote on that Panda's Thumb site, and I read a good bit of back-and-
>>> forth between her and "Mung" and it seems she was just estimating from
>>> a prediction by Sanford of humanity's future:
>>> http://www.uncommondescent.com/evolution/new-paper-using-the-avida-ev...
>>> By the way, Sanford posted their correspondence in his blog at her
>>> request, and she thanked him for it. See message number 59.
>
> Oops, he gave her permission to post it on another ID blog.

I say, you snipped my entire reply without comment. Bad show. Let me
restore it:

I will point out that Sanford explicitly says in the correspondence you
refer to that he does indeed hold to the opinion that all species were
separately created a few thousand years ago. He just says there is
another possible interpretation, that there is some kind of unknown
restorative force. But again, he is a YEC and explicitly says so in that
post. We could quibble about the difference between 6000 and 10,000. But
why would that be other than a trivial difference?

>>>> Some but not all of the authors
>>>> are known.
>>> But you don't know the identity of a single one, eh? Neither do I,
>>> although I thought the Panda's Thumb people would know.
>> We know some of the participants in the meeting.
>> It's a proceedings
>> volume. It contains papers presented at the meeting. Therefore we know
>> some of the authors.
>
> Now we do. If you knew earlier, why didn't you list any?

Not necessary to make the point.

[John Harshman]

Gossip? Why are you characterizing it that way?

>>>>> ___________________
>>>>> Douglas Theobald, assistant professor of biochemistry at Brandeis
>>>>> University, said he believed that "Springer has been duped and that
>>>>> the senior editors are unaware that this is a quack group of anti-
>>>>> evolution creationists."
>>>>> =============================
>>>>> I wonder whether he knows the names of the authors.
>
> He didn't. Here is a quote from a more detailed article:
>
> ___________________________________
> Theobald said that neither he nor his colleagues have read the book,
> but did have an idea of the content because of the blurb and the names

> of the editors. He called the book another effort �in a long sordid

> history here of trying to get pseudoscientific, anti-evolution papers
> published in journals to raise the respectability of ID with non-

> scientists�

>
> http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2012/03/01/book-intelligent-design-proponents-upsets-scientists#ixzz1oIz1h0QD
> Inside Higher Ed
> ==============================
>
>>>> I'm always amazed at how skeptical you are of anything said by any
>>>> critic of creationists,
>>> You are a critic of creationists.
>> And, oddly enough, so are you. But you seem quite credulous of anything
>> that is given the ID label instead of the creationist label.
>
> I don't see why you think that.

Because, for example, you are constantly doubting that Dembski is a
creationist despite abundant evidence. You don't believe his acceptance
of a worldwide flood, and you don't think that even if he did accept it
that would make him a creationist. That's just bending over backwards to
preserve ID as science rather than religion.

>>> ++++++++++++++++++++ saracsm on
>>> Are you always amazed at how skeptical I am of anything said by you?
>> Not always.
>>
>>> ++++++++++++++++++++ saracsm off
>>> In case anyone missed the point of the sarcasm: I am often grateful
>>> for information John posts on paleontology. He just misspoke up
>>> there.
>> Only if you're a mathematician and think that a single counterexample
>> disproves a theorem.
>
> I see you are so much of a non-mathematician that "often grateful"
> gets equated to "single counterexample."

The single counter example is the subject of paleontology. And in fact
it's not a relevant example at all, since we were talking about ID.

>> It isn't paleontology we're talking about here.
>
> I took you literally.

No, you took me out of context.

>> It's the ID industry. And you are quite sceptical of almost all I say
>> about that.
>
> Only when your evidence is very scanty. As here.

You have a special and very high evidentiary requirement that applies to
ID and nothing else.

>>>> as long as there's the least little ID beard
>>>> provided.
>>> What least little ID beard? So far, what I've seen is the least
>>> little creationist beard (Sandford's), despite an enormous amount of
>>> smoke on the Panda's Thumb blog.
>> Perhaps you are unacquainted with the term "beard" as used here? Most ID
>> is creationism, lightly disguised.
>
> Most ID can be dovetailed with creationism, and that's a different
> matter altogether. [Mine cannot.]

I'm willing to believe you on that, but it doesn't affect the point. In
fact all ID other than yours appears to be creationism, lightly
disguised. Unless you have a second example?

>> The presence of Sanford is the
>> non-beard part.
>
> So you claim. But as far as authors go, who belongs to the beard part
> and who does not?

Obviously, the authors who claim not to be creationists. Or just any
author who claims their ID is just science, folks, nothing to see here,
and not a religious belief.

>>> http://pandasthumb.org/archives/2012/02/springer-gets-s.html#comment-...
>>>> A little digging would have found you quite a bit more
>>>> information.
>>> Looks like I did a little more digging than you did,
>> What makes you think I didn't?
>
> Because you didn't name a single other editor, while I identified all
> of them last time, and neither time did you identify a single author.
> Yet the information was available two days before this latest post of
> yours, and a day before the previous one.

Perhaps I just didn't feel the need.

[John Harshman]

My point, and I did have one, is that the real world doesn't consist of
theorems.

[Mark Isaak]

On 3/5/12 1:57 PM, Robert Carnegie: Fnord: cc

talk-o...@moderators.isc.org wrote:
> On Monday, March 5, 2012 9:05:29 PM UTC, Mark Isaak wrote:
>> I guess it's time for my entry in the "Define Creationism" sweepstakes.
>>
>> Creationism is a belief in a social group's set of creation myths. So
>> creationism is not the same as creation myths, but it is inseparable
>> from them.
>>
>> A creation myth, as I noted earlier, is a myth (a sacred story) that
>> relates important details of how the world came to be ordered as it is.
>> Such myths often concern the origin of the world and of people, but
>> they are not limited to that; many also concern the origins of laws and
>> customs, of hardship and death, of important food or other natural
>> resources, etc.
>>
>> Some forms of creationism (I believe Hopi is one, as well as African
>> groups whose names I don't remember) say nothing about the creation of
>> people, because their origin-of-people myth deals with people emerging
>> from underground. Someone who adheres to such a myth I would still call
>> a creationist.
>
> But isn't that everybody, then?

There are shades of "believe in", and so there are shades to which the
label "creationism" applies. I should have elaborated, however, that I
mean only belief in a literal sense of the story, so liberal theology
that views Genesis as allegory would not be a basis for creationism.

> Doesn't that imply that natural selection is
> the creation myth of biologists and atheists?
> And the Big Bang likewise.

A defining feature of myth is that it is considered sacred. If you
consider natural selection and the Big Bang to be sacred, then you are a
creationist. I might modify my definition to require that you believe
them *because* they are sacred; I'll have to think more about that.

> I was told that my house was built in 1994:
> does that make me a creationist? I don't have
> the scriptures handy, they're under lock and key.

It is highly doubtful that those scriptures are sacred to anybody. For
that matter, they are probably not much of a story, either.

>> Even if you reserve "creationism", among biblical creationists, for the
>> origin of earth and life, I think you will find, in practice, that Noah
>> is part of the package. Even if the creationists themselves think of
>> them as different episodes, they are still part of the same set, and the
>> set is bound up in a single unit.
>

> Noah as history: YEC I suspect yes, OEC

> (if any remain) I would suppose not. But
> I haven't taken a poll.

Me either. My impression is that OECs tend to believe in a regional
flood. But I would like to see the poll.

[John S. Wilkins]

Is that generally true?

[Walter Bushell]

In article <1kgl16p.1kacm421aororjN%jo...@wilkins.id.au>,

jo...@wilkins.id.au (John S. Wilkins) wrote:

> John Harshman <jhar...@pacbell.net> wrote:
>
> > Tim Norfolk wrote:
> > > On Mar 3, 9:48 am, John Harshman <jharsh...@pacbell.net> wrote:
> > > <snip>
> > >> Only if you're a mathematician and think that a single counterexample
> > >> disproves a theorem.
> > > <snip>
> > >
> > > A single counterexample does disprove a theorem. That's just the way
> > > it works.
> > >
> > My point, and I did have one, is that the real world doesn't consist of
> > theorems.
>
> Is that generally true?

Let me propose that the world consists only of theorems or perchance
theories.

Has anyone done this before?

--
This space unintentionally left blank.

[John Harshman]

John S. Wilkins wrote:
> John Harshman <jhar...@pacbell.net> wrote:
>
>> Tim Norfolk wrote:
>>> On Mar 3, 9:48 am, John Harshman <jharsh...@pacbell.net> wrote:
>>> <snip>
>>>> Only if you're a mathematician and think that a single counterexample
>>>> disproves a theorem.
>>> <snip>
>>>
>>> A single counterexample does disprove a theorem. That's just the way
>>> it works.
>>>
>> My point, and I did have one, is that the real world doesn't consist of
>> theorems.
>
> Is that generally true?

I have a most wonderful proof that it is, but unfortunately it won't fit
into a usenet post.

[John S. Wilkins]

Die Welt ist alles das der Fall ist...

[Tim Norfolk]

On Mar 6, 7:42 pm, John Harshman <jharsh...@pacbell.net> wrote:
> John S. Wilkins wrote:

> into a usenet post.- Hide quoted text -
>
> - Show quoted text -

Check the margin.

[Tim Norfolk]

Absolutely. But that's not what you said above.

[John Harshman]

Tim Norfolk wrote:
> On Mar 6, 11:11 am, John Harshman <jharsh...@pacbell.net> wrote:
>> Tim Norfolk wrote:
>>> On Mar 3, 9:48 am, John Harshman <jharsh...@pacbell.net> wrote:
>>> <snip>
>>>> Only if you're a mathematician and think that a single counterexample
>>>> disproves a theorem.
>>> <snip>
>>> A single counterexample does disprove a theorem. That's just the way
>>> it works.
>> My point, and I did have one, is that the real world doesn't consist of
>> theorems.
>
> Absolutely. But that's not what you said above.
>

It is if you read properly. You may have difficulty with that if you're
a mathematician.

[pnyikos]

> >http://cjandhj.blogspot.com/2011/06/trip-to-state-college-and-ithaca-...

> >   #Wesley Brewer:
> > A Masked Panda (F10Q) | March 1, 2012 12:58 PM
> >    #Winston Ewert and George Montanez:
> > afarensis | March 1, 2012 1:44 PM |
>
> > Strangely enough, the usual gossip about them being creationists is
> > missing.
>
> Gossip? Why are you characterizing it that way?

Because that's what the original post and most of the 100+ comments on
it were:

http://pandasthumb.org/archives/2012/02/springer-gets-s.html

And now two people have started gossiping about me. I've replied to
one, and am still debating whether to reply to the other.

The comments in the wake of the later "update" article are much more
restrained, on the whole.

>
>
>
>
> >>>>> ___________________
> >>>>> Douglas Theobald, assistant professor of biochemistry at Brandeis
> >>>>> University, said he believed that "Springer has been duped and that
> >>>>> the senior editors are unaware that this is a quack group of anti-
> >>>>> evolution creationists."
> >>>>> =============================
> >>>>> I wonder whether he knows the names of the authors.
>
> > He didn't.  Here is a quote from a more detailed article:
>
> > ___________________________________
> > Theobald said that neither he nor his colleagues have read the book,
> > but did have an idea of the content because of the blurb and the names
> > of the editors. He called the book another effort �in a long sordid
> > history here of trying to get pseudoscientific, anti-evolution papers
> > published in journals to raise the respectability of ID with non-
> > scientists�
>

> >  http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2012/03/01/book-intelligent-design...

> > Inside Higher Ed
> > ==============================
>
> >>>> I'm always amazed at how skeptical you are of anything said by any
> >>>> critic of creationists,
> >>> You are a critic of creationists.
> >> And, oddly enough, so are you. But you seem quite credulous of anything
> >> that is given the ID label instead of the creationist label.
>
> > I don't see why you think that.
>
> Because, for example, you are constantly doubting that Dembski is a
> creationist despite abundant evidence.

I don't recall you ever giving any evidence other than his acceptance
of a worldwide flood, and of a literal Adam and Eve. Did you even
MENTION any other evidence?

> You don't believe his acceptance
> of a worldwide flood,

Given documentation, I will.

> and you don't think that even if he did accept it
> that would make him a creationist.

Of course not. A worldwide flood says nothing one way or another
about whether living things evolved.

> That's just bending over backwards to
> preserve ID as science rather than religion.

No, it's common sense. And the issue HERE is whether Dembski is a
creationist, not whether his ID deserves to be called a science.

But now that you've broached the subject -- can you prove he doesn't
stick to scientific methodology?

>
> >>> ++++++++++++++++++++ saracsm on
> >>> Are you always amazed at how skeptical I am of anything said by you?
> >> Not always.
>
> >>> ++++++++++++++++++++ saracsm off
> >>> In case anyone missed the point of the sarcasm: I am often grateful
> >>> for information John posts on paleontology.  He just misspoke up
> >>> there.
> >> Only if you're a mathematician and think that a single counterexample
> >> disproves a theorem.
>
> > I see you are so much of a non-mathematician that "often grateful"
> > gets equated to "single counterexample."
>
> The single counter example is the subject of paleontology.

And your single example is Dembski, about whom you and I have shared
only a minuscule amount of information compared to all we've shared
about paleontology.

Do you think a single example proves a theorem?

[...]

> >> It's the ID industry. And you are quite sceptical of almost all I say
> >> about that.
>
> > Only when your evidence is very scanty.  As here.
>
> You have a special and very high evidentiary requirement that applies to
> ID and nothing else.

Wrong. I have a much higher evidentiary requirement where the
existence of a creator of our universe is concerned. And you knew
that, only you forgot it.

> >>>> as long as there's the least little ID beard
> >>>> provided.
> >>> What least little ID beard?  So far, what I've seen is the least
> >>> little creationist beard (Sandford's), despite an enormous amount of
> >>> smoke on the Panda's Thumb blog.
> >> Perhaps you are unacquainted with the term "beard" as used here? Most ID
> >> is creationism, lightly disguised.
>
> > Most ID can be dovetailed with creationism, and that's a different
> > matter altogether.  [Mine cannot.]
>
> I'm willing to believe you on that, but it doesn't affect the point. In
> fact all ID other than yours appears to be creationism, lightly
> disguised.

Nevertheless, it is possible to stick to the methodology of science
even while arguing for intelligent design.

> Unless you have a second example?
>
> >> The presence of Sanford is the
> >> non-beard part.
>
> > So you claim.  But as far as authors go, who belongs to the beard part
> > and who does not?
>
> Obviously, the authors who claim not to be creationists. Or just any
> author who claims their ID is just science, folks, nothing to see here,
> and not a religious belief.

You are missing the point about methodology. The conference may have
consisted of creationists of one stripe or another, but that doesn't
make it a conference on creationism.

Peter Nyikos

[Walter Bushell]

In article
<a230c57c-667b-49d0...@t15g2000yqi.googlegroups.com>,

Well yes, everyone knows the world is composed of computer instructions.

[John Harshman]

You will have to define "gossip" for me, because I don't see it.

Don't know, but that's plenty of evidence right there. He has also
expressed skepticism that humans are related to apes. And, prompted by
your request below, I find it's more than skepticism: it's a clear
statement that we are not.

>> You don't believe his acceptance
>> of a worldwide flood,
>
> Given documentation, I will.

You could look it up yourself, you know. I just googled "Dembski flood",
which you could have done yourself.

http://www.religiondispatches.org/dispatches/laurilebo/3595/discovery_institute’s_bill_dembski_recants

I note that I had misremembered, and in addition to accepting a flood,
he also accepts that humans are all descended from the original pair,
and only them, and that they were specially created by god, without
ancestors. Humans, in other words, are not related to the rest of life.
How's that for creationism?

>> and you don't think that even if he did accept it
>> that would make him a creationist.
>
> Of course not. A worldwide flood says nothing one way or another
> about whether living things evolved.

Not if you consider it as a mathematical theorem, perhaps. But really,
was that a rational response in the real world? We're talking about a
mass extinction within the last few thousand years and repopulation of
the entire world from somewhere in (apparently) Armenia. Much of the
fossil record (opinions differ over how much) is of a single year, and
everything above that is a few thousand. How's that for evolution?

Now in the real world, a worldwide flood is a symptom of biblical
literalism, and biblical literalism also requires creationism. Further,
the worldwide flood creates problems for earth history that can only be
resolved by extensive divine intervention in the history of life, i.e.
creationism.

>> That's just bending over backwards to
>> preserve ID as science rather than religion.
>
> No, it's common sense. And the issue HERE is whether Dembski is a
> creationist, not whether his ID deserves to be called a science.

If you call that common sense, you need to get out more.

> But now that you've broached the subject -- can you prove he doesn't
> stick to scientific methodology?

Spoken again like a mathematician. "Prove"? Now since Dembski never
actually does anything using scientific methodology -- his work is
entirely theoretical, never empirical -- the question is moot. But I
would have to say that his acceptance of a worldwide flood shows that he
gets at least some of his views on scientific subjects from revelation
rather than examination of the world. Wouldn't you agree?

>>>>> ++++++++++++++++++++ saracsm on
>>>>> Are you always amazed at how skeptical I am of anything said by you?
>>>> Not always.
>>>>> ++++++++++++++++++++ saracsm off
>>>>> In case anyone missed the point of the sarcasm: I am often grateful
>>>>> for information John posts on paleontology. He just misspoke up
>>>>> there.
>>>> Only if you're a mathematician and think that a single counterexample
>>>> disproves a theorem.
>>> I see you are so much of a non-mathematician that "often grateful"
>>> gets equated to "single counterexample."
>> The single counter example is the subject of paleontology.
>
> And your single example is Dembski, about whom you and I have shared
> only a minuscule amount of information compared to all we've shared
> about paleontology.

So far, yes.

> Do you think a single example proves a theorem?

No, but I don't think the world consists of theorems. I'm not
immediately thinking of other examples, but I believe there have been
many. You may disagree.

>>>> It's the ID industry. And you are quite sceptical of almost all I say
>>>> about that.
>>> Only when your evidence is very scanty. As here.
>> You have a special and very high evidentiary requirement that applies to
>> ID and nothing else.
>
> Wrong. I have a much higher evidentiary requirement where the
> existence of a creator of our universe is concerned. And you knew
> that, only you forgot it.

Did I? Can you show that I did? But fine. You have special requirements
for two things, and nothing else.

>>>>>> as long as there's the least little ID beard
>>>>>> provided.
>>>>> What least little ID beard? So far, what I've seen is the least
>>>>> little creationist beard (Sandford's), despite an enormous amount of
>>>>> smoke on the Panda's Thumb blog.
>>>> Perhaps you are unacquainted with the term "beard" as used here? Most ID
>>>> is creationism, lightly disguised.
>>> Most ID can be dovetailed with creationism, and that's a different
>>> matter altogether. [Mine cannot.]
>> I'm willing to believe you on that, but it doesn't affect the point. In
>> fact all ID other than yours appears to be creationism, lightly
>> disguised.
>
> Nevertheless, it is possible to stick to the methodology of science
> even while arguing for intelligent design.

In principle, perhaps. In practice, are there any such among prominent
IDers? I don't see it. If you're putting yourself forth as the exception
(and if we waive the "prominent" requirement) I still don't see you
using much scientific methodology.

>> Unless you have a second example?
>>
>>>> The presence of Sanford is the
>>>> non-beard part.
>>> So you claim. But as far as authors go, who belongs to the beard part
>>> and who does not?
>> Obviously, the authors who claim not to be creationists. Or just any
>> author who claims their ID is just science, folks, nothing to see here,
>> and not a religious belief.
>
> You are missing the point about methodology. The conference may have
> consisted of creationists of one stripe or another, but that doesn't
> make it a conference on creationism.

It does if it was a conference on ID and if ID as practiced by everyone
except you is just a thinly disguised creationism. Which is the case.

[Mitchell Coffey]

On Mar 6, 9:00 pm, j...@wilkins.id.au (John S. Wilkins) wrote:
> Walter Bushell <pr...@panix.com> wrote:

> > In article <1kgl16p.1kacm421aororjN%j...@wilkins.id.au>,
> >  j...@wilkins.id.au (John S. Wilkins) wrote:

>
> > > John Harshman <jharsh...@pacbell.net> wrote:
>
> > > > Tim Norfolk wrote:
> > > > > On Mar 3, 9:48 am, John Harshman <jharsh...@pacbell.net> wrote:
> > > > > <snip>
> > > > >> Only if you're a mathematician and think that a single counterexample
> > > > >> disproves a theorem.
> > > > > <snip>
>
> > > > > A single counterexample does disprove a theorem. That's just the way
> > > > > it works.
>
> > > > My point, and I did have one, is that the real world doesn't consist of
> > > > theorems.
>
> > > Is that generally true?
>
> > Let me propose that the world consists only of theorems or perchance
> > theories.
>
> > Has anyone done this before?
>
> Die Welt ist alles das der Fall ist...

Quoting some old tract again?

Mitchell

[Tim Norfolk]

On Mar 7, 8:36 am, Walter Bushell <pr...@panix.com> wrote:
> In article

> <a230c57c-667b-49d0-8cc2-9a8242d54...@t15g2000yqi.googlegroups.com>,

>  Tim Norfolk <timsn...@aol.com> wrote:
>
> > On Mar 6, 11:11 am, John Harshman <jharsh...@pacbell.net> wrote:
> > > Tim Norfolk wrote:
> > > > On Mar 3, 9:48 am, John Harshman <jharsh...@pacbell.net> wrote:
> > > > <snip>
> > > >> Only if you're a mathematician and think that a single counterexample
> > > >> disproves a theorem.
> > > > <snip>
>
> > > > A single counterexample does disprove a theorem. That's just the way
> > > > it works.
>
> > > My point, and I did have one, is that the real world doesn't consist of
> > > theorems.
>
> > Absolutely. But that's not what you said above.
>
> Well yes, everyone knows the world is composed of computer instructions.
>
> --
> This space unintentionally left blank.

Isn't it? What else is DNA?

[Tim Norfolk]

...must...resist...continuing...argument

[John S. Wilkins]

Just some philosophicus, yeah.

[Michael Siemon]

In article <1kgml87.i4m4mx14hgchmN%jo...@wilkins.id.au>,

jo...@wilkins.id.au (John S. Wilkins) wrote:

> Mitchell Coffey <mitchel...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > On Mar 6, 9:00 pm, j...@wilkins.id.au (John S. Wilkins) wrote:
> > > Walter Bushell <pr...@panix.com> wrote:
> > > > In article <1kgl16p.1kacm421aororjN%j...@wilkins.id.au>,
> > > > j...@wilkins.id.au (John S. Wilkins) wrote:
> > >
> > > > > John Harshman <jharsh...@pacbell.net> wrote:
> > >
> > > > > > Tim Norfolk wrote:
> > > > > > > On Mar 3, 9:48 am, John Harshman <jharsh...@pacbell.net> wrote:
> > > > > > > <snip>
> > > > > > >> Only if you're a mathematician and think that a single
> > > > > > >> counterexample disproves a theorem.
> > > > > > > <snip>
> > >
> > > > > > > A single counterexample does disprove a theorem. That's just the
> > > > > > > way it works.
> > >
> > > > > > My point, and I did have one, is that the real world doesn't
> > > > > > consist of theorems.
> > >
> > > > > Is that generally true?
> > >
> > > > Let me propose that the world consists only of theorems or perchance
> > > > theories.
> > >
> > > > Has anyone done this before?
> > >
> > > Die Welt ist alles das der Fall ist...
> >
> > Quoting some old tract again?
> >
> Just some philosophicus, yeah.

very logico of you...

[John S. Wilkins]

I just make these, you know, remarks, when I do my investigations. In
the end I will zettel into a stable view, I am sure. For now, it's a bit
of a game.

[Burkhard]

On Mar 7, 8:52 pm, j...@wilkins.id.au (John S. Wilkins) wrote:
> Michael Siemon <mlsie...@sonic.net> wrote:
> > In article <1kgml87.i4m4mx14hgchmN%j...@wilkins.id.au>,

> >  j...@wilkins.id.au (John S. Wilkins) wrote:
>

You should be beaten blue and brown for that pun

[Mitchell Coffey]

On Mar 7, 3:52 pm, j...@wilkins.id.au (John S. Wilkins) wrote:
> Michael Siemon <mlsie...@sonic.net> wrote:

> > In article <1kgml87.i4m4mx14hgchmN%j...@wilkins.id.au>,

> >  j...@wilkins.id.au (John S. Wilkins) wrote:
>

I've only had one stable view, once in my life. Alright, you get the
sort of picture: my cabin was on the hill, overlooking the paddock.

Mitchell

[John S. Wilkins]

Burkhard <b.sc...@ed.ac.uk> wrote:

> On Mar 7, 8:52 pm, j...@wilkins.id.au (John S. Wilkins) wrote:
> > Michael Siemon <mlsie...@sonic.net> wrote:
> > > In article <1kgml87.i4m4mx14hgchmN%j...@wilkins.id.au>,
> > > j...@wilkins.id.au (John S. Wilkins) wrote:
> >
> > > > Mitchell Coffey <mitchell.cof...@gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> > > > > On Mar 6, 9:00 pm, j...@wilkins.id.au (John S. Wilkins) wrote:
> > > > > > Walter Bushell <pr...@panix.com> wrote:
> > > > > > > In article <1kgl16p.1kacm421aororjN%j...@wilkins.id.au>,
> > > > > > > j...@wilkins.id.au (John S. Wilkins) wrote:
> >
> > > > > > > > John Harshman <jharsh...@pacbell.net> wrote:
> >
> > > > > > > > > Tim Norfolk wrote:
> > > > > > > > > > John Harshman <jharsh...@pacbell.net> wrote:
> > > > > > > > > > <snip>
> > > > > > > > > >> Only if you're a mathematician and think that a single
> > > > > > > > > >> counterexample disproves a theorem.
> > > > > > > > > > <snip>
> >
> > > > > > > > > > A single counterexample does disprove a theorem. That's
> > > > > > > > > > just the way it works.

Do not seek to ask for whom the modus tollens. It tollens for thee...

> >
> > > > > > > > > My point, and I did have one, is that the real world doesn't
> > > > > > > > > consist of theorems.
> >
> > > > > > > > Is that generally true?
> >
> > > > > > > Let me propose that the world consists only of theorems or
> > > > > > > perchance theories.
> >
> > > > > > > Has anyone done this before?
> >
> > > > > > Die Welt ist alles das der Fall ist...
> >
> > > > > Quoting some old tract again?
> >
> > > > Just some philosophicus, yeah.
> >
> > > very logico of you...
> >
> > I just make these, you know, remarks, when I do my investigations. In
> > the end I will zettel into a stable view, I am sure. For now, it's a bit
> > of a game.
> > --
>
> You should be beaten blue and brown for that pun

Hey! I resemble that remark. And so do my family!

[Ron O]

Go back and respond where you should have responded and not pretend
that I had not already responded to your bull pucky.

http://groups.google.com/group/talk.origins/msg/0df5bba3bddf9973

Make your arguments there and demonstrate that the crap that you are
repeating wasn't refuted before.

If you want to respond to one of my posts, respond to the post instead
of to some other poster. That isn't a demand that is just common
sense.

Ron Okimoto

[John Harshman]

Have to agree. And it's common courtesy too. Not just to Ron, but to me.

[Harry K]

On Mar 2, 9:44 pm, pnyikos <nyik...@bellsouth.net> wrote:
> On Mar 2, 9:33 pm, John Harshman <jharsh...@pacbell.net> wrote:
>
>
>
>
>
> > pnyikos wrote:

> > > On Mar 2, 4:35 pm, Jason Spaceman <jspace...@linuxquestions.net>
> > > wrote:
> > >> From the article:
> > >> ----------------------------------------------------------------
> > >> The publisher of an intelligent design book has decided to put
> > >> publication plans for the book on hold after some scientists
> > >> complained that such challenges to evolution theories should not be
> > >> presented in an academic publication.
>
> > >> International science publisher Springer had set the publication date
> > >> for Biological Information: New Perspectives for March 31. The
> > >> publishing house apparently began hearing complaints, though, after
> > >> Nick Matzke posted a Feb. 27 article titled, "Springer gets suckered
> > >> by creationist pseudoscience" on Panda's Thumb, a blog "critical of
> > >> the antievolution movement."
> > >> ------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> > >> Read it athttp://www.christianpost.com/news/intelligent-design-book-meets-obsta...
> > >> orhttp://tinyurl.com/6r5ro63
>
> > >> J. Spaceman

>
> > > The following excerpt is a lot more revealing than all the hooha:
>
> > > _____________________________________________
> > > A representative from Springer told Kaustuv Basu, a reporter for
> > > Inside Higher Ed, that the company had decided to submit the
> > > manuscript for additional peer review.
>
> > > None of the critics have read the book. Their criticism is based upon
> > > their knowledge of the authors and their ideas.

> > > ====================================
>
> > > And who *are* the authors, you ask?  Dunno.  The article does not
> > > reveal their names.  All you learn about is that one of the editors is
> > > "John Sanford, one of the books editors and a semi-retired professor
> > > at Cornell University's Department of Horticulture" but you aren't
> > > told whether he is one of the authors of some article in there as

> > > well.  It also says:
>
> > > ___________________
> > > Douglas Theobald, assistant professor of biochemistry at Brandeis
> > > University, said he believed that "Springer has been duped and that
> > > the senior editors are unaware that this is a quack group of anti-
> > > evolution creationists."
> > > =============================
>
> > > I wonder whether he knows the names of the authors.
>

> > I'm always amazed at how skeptical you are of anything said by any
> > critic of creationists,
>
> You are a critic of creationists.
>

> ++++++++++++++++++++ saracsm on
>
> Are you always amazed at how skeptical I am of anything said by you?
>

> ++++++++++++++++++++ saracsm off
>
> In case anyone missed the point of the sarcasm: I am often grateful
> for information John posts on paleontology.  He just misspoke up
> there.
>

> >as long as there's the least little ID beard
> > provided.
>
> What least little ID beard?  So far, what I've seen is the least
> little creationist beard (Sandford's), despite an enormous amount of
> smoke on the Panda's Thumb blog.
>

> http://pandasthumb.org/archives/2012/02/springer-gets-s.html#comment-...
>
> > A little digging would have found you quite a bit more
> > information.
>

> Looks like I did a little more digging than you did, because I found

> the names of the other editors on that Panda's Thumb blog:
>
> Marks II, R.J.; Behe, M.J.; Dembski, W.A.; Gordon, B.L.;
>

> I know the middle two aren't creationists in the usual t.o. senses;
> what about the other two?

>
> >These are the proceedings of an invitation-only creationist
> > conference.
>

> Reference?  or are you like John Stockwell, using "creationist" as an
> umbrella to encompass all nationally famous ID proponents?
>
> I say "nationally famous" because you certainly don't think of me as a

> creationist, despite my opinion that life on earth is the result of
> seeding by panspermists who probably did extensive ID on the
> prokaryotes (and possibly primitive eukaryotes) that they sent.
>

Yes, we are well aware of that. How about you tell us where the
"panspermists" came from?

<snip>

Harry K

[pnyikos]

> http://www.religiondispatches.org/dispatches/laurilebo/3595/discovery...s_bill_dembski_recants

>
> I note that I had misremembered, and in addition to accepting a flood,
> he also accepts that humans are all descended from the original pair,
> and only them, and that they were specially created by god, without
> ancestors. Humans, in other words, are not related to the rest of life.
> How's that for creationism?

Game, set, and match to you. Congratulations.

The following was written before I saw the convincing website you just
gave me, and I stand by what I said as an abstract principle, no
longer connected with Dembski of course.

> >> and you don't think that even if he did accept it
> >> that would make him a creationist.
>
> > Of course not.  A worldwide flood says nothing one way or another
> > about whether living things evolved.
>
> Not if you consider it as a mathematical theorem, perhaps. But really,
> was that a rational response in the real world? We're talking about a
> mass extinction within the last few thousand years and repopulation of
> the entire world from somewhere in (apparently) Armenia.

Only if one takes the biblical account with excruciating literalness.
There may have been many arks, for example, the people manning each
ark oblivious to the existence of the others.

That's one of many possibilities, but I must close this post--an
urgent errand awaits me.

Peter Nyikos

[John Harshman]

It seems to me the example is instructive. You won't accept Dembski is a
creationist just because he believes in a worldwide, recent flood and a
literal Adam and Eve who are the sole progenitors of the human race.
That requires special pleading.

>>>> and you don't think that even if he did accept it
>>>> that would make him a creationist.
>>> Of course not. A worldwide flood says nothing one way or another
>>> about whether living things evolved.
>> Not if you consider it as a mathematical theorem, perhaps. But really,
>> was that a rational response in the real world? We're talking about a
>> mass extinction within the last few thousand years and repopulation of
>> the entire world from somewhere in (apparently) Armenia.
>
> Only if one takes the biblical account with excruciating literalness.
> There may have been many arks, for example, the people manning each
> ark oblivious to the existence of the others.

Special pleading again. No matter how many arks you allow for, the
scenario just won't work.

> That's one of many possibilities,

One of many farfetched possibilities that amount again to special
pleading in order to avoid an obvious conclusion.

[pnyikos]

> >> I note that I had misremembered, and in addition to accepting a flood,
> >> he also accepts that humans are all descended from the original pair,
> >> and only them, and that they were specially created by god, without
> >> ancestors. Humans, in other words, are not related to the rest of life.
> >> How's that for creationism?
>
> > Game, set, and match to you.  Congratulations.
>
> > The following was written before I saw the convincing website you just
> > gave me, and I stand by what I said as an abstract principle, no
> > longer connected with Dembski of course.
>
> It seems to me the example is instructive. You won't accept Dembski is a
> creationist just because he believes in a worldwide, recent flood and a
> literal Adam and Eve who are the sole progenitors of the human race.
> That requires special pleading.

On the contrary, what requires special pleading is you trying to
revive the Dembski context after I already conceded it. "the
following" referred to a worldwide flood; Adam and Eve were not a part
of what was discussed below.

> >>>> and you don't think that even if he did accept it
> >>>> that would make him a creationist.
> >>> Of course not.  A worldwide flood says nothing one way or another
> >>> about whether living things evolved.
> >> Not if you consider it as a mathematical theorem, perhaps. But really,
> >> was that a rational response in the real world? We're talking about a
> >> mass extinction within the last few thousand years and repopulation of
> >> the entire world from somewhere in (apparently) Armenia.
>
> > Only if one takes the biblical account with excruciating literalness.
> > There may have been many arks, for example, the people manning each
> > ark oblivious to the existence of the others.
>
> Special pleading again. No matter how many arks you allow for, the
> scenario just won't work.

And why not? Are you dragging the Dembski context back in, the YEC
notion that all the fossils [which were actually laid down over
billions of years] were laid down in a few thousand years? As you
wrote in the earlier post, evidently referring to Dembski's
capitulation to a bunch of fundies:

>>> Much of the fossil record (opinions differ over how much)
>>> is of a single year, and everything above that is a
>>> few thousand. How's that for evolution?

But a worldwide flood says nothing about how much time elapsed prior
to it.

Look. Before I encountered YECs who are really aggressive about a
Biblical account of "the flood" being the answer to all sorts of
things (including the last ice age, sacre bleu!), I read about people
who took a more modest view of the matter, saying that since almost
every culture has some flood myth, maybe there really was a worldwide
flood. Of course, the geological evidence is very much against it,
but folklorists aren't particularly well versed in geology.

In anticipation of a possible request: I no longer remember where I
read these things, it was well over half my lifetime ago.

You also wrote:

>>>Now in the real world, a worldwide flood is a symptom
>>>of biblical literalism,

Or maybe Lemuria. The early theosophists had some weird flood ideas
of their own. Also there was Churchwald, with his lost continent of
Mu.

>>> Further,
>>>the worldwide flood creates problems for earth history that
>>>can only be resolved by extensive divine intervention in
>>>the history of life, i.e. creationism.

If someone accepts the geological facts about what actually happened
up to 10,000 years ago and then speculates about a worldwide flood,
one having no significant effect on the fossil record that had been
built up prior to it, he is in the general milieu of "theistic
evolutionists", who are creationists *sensu* Okimoto, but not in the
sense you or I use the word.

Peter Nyikos

[John Harshman]

If you read back in the thread you will find they are.

>>>>>> and you don't think that even if he did accept it
>>>>>> that would make him a creationist.
>>>>> Of course not. A worldwide flood says nothing one way or another
>>>>> about whether living things evolved.
>>>> Not if you consider it as a mathematical theorem, perhaps. But really,
>>>> was that a rational response in the real world? We're talking about a
>>>> mass extinction within the last few thousand years and repopulation of
>>>> the entire world from somewhere in (apparently) Armenia.
>>> Only if one takes the biblical account with excruciating literalness.
>>> There may have been many arks, for example, the people manning each
>>> ark oblivious to the existence of the others.
>> Special pleading again. No matter how many arks you allow for, the
>> scenario just won't work.
>
> And why not? Are you dragging the Dembski context back in, the YEC
> notion that all the fossils [which were actually laid down over
> billions of years] were laid down in a few thousand years? As you
> wrote in the earlier post, evidently referring to Dembski's
> capitulation to a bunch of fundies:
>
>>>> Much of the fossil record (opinions differ over how much)
>>>> is of a single year, and everything above that is a
>>>> few thousand. How's that for evolution?
>
> But a worldwide flood says nothing about how much time elapsed prior
> to it.

There you are thinking like a mathematician. There is no logical
syllogism connecting a worldwide flood, in the abstract, to YEC. But we
aren't talking about an abstract flood that nobody in the world has ever
proposed, one that had no visible effects in the fossil record or the
stratigraphic one, for that matter, and for which there were thousands
of independent arks. We're talking about the Flood of Noah.

> Look. Before I encountered YECs who are really aggressive about a
> Biblical account of "the flood" being the answer to all sorts of
> things (including the last ice age, sacre bleu!), I read about people
> who took a more modest view of the matter, saying that since almost
> every culture has some flood myth, maybe there really was a worldwide
> flood. Of course, the geological evidence is very much against it,
> but folklorists aren't particularly well versed in geology.

You're claiming these people weren't creationists? I doubt that would be
true. The only such people I know of are coming at it from a creationist
perspective. They find the myths because they want to show the flood is
true, not decide a flood might be true because of widespread myths. Nor
are the correct that almost every culture has a flood myth.

> In anticipation of a possible request: I no longer remember where I
> read these things, it was well over half my lifetime ago.
>
> You also wrote:
>
>>>> Now in the real world, a worldwide flood is a symptom
>>>> of biblical literalism,
>
> Or maybe Lemuria. The early theosophists had some weird flood ideas
> of their own. Also there was Churchwald, with his lost continent of
> Mu.

Not a worldwide flood. Sinking continents are something else entirely,
unless the all sink. And it's Churchward.

>>>> Further,
>>>> the worldwide flood creates problems for earth history that
>>>> can only be resolved by extensive divine intervention in
>>>> the history of life, i.e. creationism.
>
> If someone accepts the geological facts about what actually happened
> up to 10,000 years ago and then speculates about a worldwide flood,
> one having no significant effect on the fossil record that had been
> built up prior to it, he is in the general milieu of "theistic
> evolutionists", who are creationists *sensu* Okimoto, but not in the
> sense you or I use the word.

Are there any such people? You can make up hypothetical entities all you
want, but they aren't useful in deciding what to believe about real
situations. In the real world, Floodite=creationist.

[Mark Isaak]

On 3/22/12 8:36 PM, pnyikos wrote:
> [...]

> You also wrote:
>
>>>> Now in the real world, a worldwide flood is a symptom
>>>> of biblical literalism,
>
> Or maybe Lemuria.

That was a sunken subcontinent, originally proposed to explain faunal
similarities between Madagascar and India. Lemuria supporters would
almost certainly argue *against* a global flood.

> The early theosophists had some weird flood ideas of their own.

Though I admit I am not as familiar with them as I should be, I have
heard of no worldwide floods from them.

> Also there was Churchwald, with his lost continent of Mu.

Again, nothing worldwide.

>>>> Further,
>>>> the worldwide flood creates problems for earth history that
>>>> can only be resolved by extensive divine intervention in
>>>> the history of life, i.e. creationism.
>
> If someone accepts the geological facts about what actually happened
> up to 10,000 years ago and then speculates about a worldwide flood,
> one having no significant effect on the fossil record that had been
> built up prior to it, he is in the general milieu of "theistic
> evolutionists", who are creationists *sensu* Okimoto, but not in the
> sense you or I use the word.

Belief in a worldwide flood is not a defining feature of creationism,
but it is (among Christians) *extremely* indicative. Donating money to
the Republican party does not make the donor a Republican, either, but
that's the way to bet. In fact, I expect that there are more Democrats
who donate large amounts to Republicans than there are Christians who
believe in a literal worldwide flood but are not creationists. It is
far more common to believe in a literal creation but no worldwide flood.

--
Mark Isaak eciton (at) curioustaxonomy (dot) net
"It is certain, from experience, that the smallest grain of natural
honesty and benevolence has more effect on men's conduct, than the most
pompous views suggested by theological theories and systems." - D. Hume

[TomS]

"On Fri, 23 Mar 2012 01:03:47 -0700, in article
<jkhap2$usu$1...@speranza.aioe.org>, Mark Isaak stated..."

I don't know what it means to "believe in a literal creation".

Do you mean to believe that God is the Creator of all things?

Or do you mean to believe a particular scenario of creation happening
a few thousand years ago as a literal reading of the Bible?


--
---Tom S.
"Ah, yeah, well, whenever you notice something like that, a wizard did it"
Lucy Lawless, the Simpsons "Treehouse of Horror X: Desperately Xeeking Xena"
(1999)

[Frank J]

On Friday, March 2, 2012 4:35:53 PM UTC-5, Jason Spaceman wrote:
> From the article:
> ----------------------------------------------------------------
> The publisher of an intelligent design book has decided to put
> publication plans for the book on hold after some scientists
> complained that such challenges to evolution theories should not be
> presented in an academic publication.
>
> International science publisher Springer had set the publication date
> for Biological Information: New Perspectives for March 31. The
> publishing house apparently began hearing complaints, though, after
> Nick Matzke posted a Feb. 27 article titled, "Springer gets suckered
> by creationist pseudoscience" on Panda's Thumb, a blog "critical of
> the antievolution movement."
> ------------------------------------------------------------------
>

> Read it at http://www.christianpost.com/news/intelligent-design-book-meets-obstacle-after-proponents-of-evolution-complain-70682/
> or http://tinyurl.com/6r5ro63
>
>
>
> J. Spaceman

Jason, I appreciate all the work you have done over the years at finding these articles, even if some of them have me pulling out my hair at how unreasonable science-deniers can be. But would it kill you to say "critics of pseudoscience" instead of "proponents of evolution"?

[pnyikos]

CC: John Harshman

John, I get the distinct impression that you actually believe what Ron
O wrote below.

Did you even know he was addressing me? He not only deleted
everything I wrote, he even deleted the attribution line for me.

On Mar 22, 9:12 am, John Harshman <jharsh...@pacbell.net> wrote:
> Ron O wrote in direct follow-up to the following post by me:

http://groups.google.com/group/talk.origins/msg/788962f6e713bebf

> > Go back and respond where you should have responded

I responded to a post by you, John, in which you were setting the
record straight on some of the things Ron O was talking about. But he
was lying about some things you did not know about, and I let you know
what he was lying about in two separate follow-ups to your post. The
url for the first reply is above, the one for the second is:

http://groups.google.com/group/talk.origins/msg/3d5c54b77a0150dc

You obviously didn't bother trying to find out which of us was telling
the truth, even though you told me on another thread that you saw
nothing in either of these replies to YOU that called for comment by
you.

> >and not pretend
> > that I had not already responded to your bull pucky.
>
> >http://groups.google.com/group/talk.origins/msg/0df5bba3bddf9973

This is a multiple lie; not only am I not pretending, but the post to
which Ron O falsely said I should have responded did not refute
anything I wrote in those two replies to you, John.

In fact, Ron O's post whose url he gives above was made on March 2,
two days before Ron O started lying to you about me and more than a
full day after you first asked him in what way I am a creationist.

It would take me a good deal of time to set the whole record straight,
but I don't think you even want me to start, John. Am I wrong?

> > Make your arguments there and demonstrate that the crap that you are
> > repeating wasn't refuted before.

Note the bogus shifting of the burden of proof onto me, by a person
who didn't even have the common courtesy to let people on this thread
know who he was responding to, let alone let them see what "crap" I am
alleged to be repeating.

> > If you want to respond to one of my posts, respond to the post instead
> > of to some other poster.

As I already said, I was responding to a post by YOU, John, pointing
out more than once how right you were about what you had said to Ron
O. If that isn't common courtesy, I'd like to know what is.

> > That isn't a demand that is just common
> > sense.

It is an arrogant demand, because the lies I was responding to on this
thread were different than the lie at which I caught Ron O red-handed
on the other thread. The post to which Ron O is demanding a response
is an elaborate smokescreen to hide the fact that I had caught Ron O
red-handed.

> Have to agree. And it's common courtesy too. Not just to Ron, but to me.

Since you obviously don't think it is common courtesy to reply to
every post someone makes in direct reply to you [see the two above
examples] I'd like to know what this "common courtesy" is all about,
and why it is a common courtesy to YOU.

Will you even reply to this post of mine, or will I find out on some
other thread that you didn't think anything in it was worth commenting
on?

Peter Nyikos

[backspace]

On Mar 3, 6:44 am, pnyikos <nyik...@bellsouth.net> wrote:
> I say "nationally famous" because you certainly don't think of me as a
> creationist, despite my opinion that life on earth is the result of
> seeding by panspermists who probably did extensive ID on the
> prokaryotes (and possibly primitive eukaryotes) that they sent.

Who made the panspermists?

[John Harshman]

pnyikos wrote:

> Will you even reply to this post of mine, or will I find out on some
> other thread that you didn't think anything in it was worth commenting
> on?

No, you will find out in this thread that I don't think anything in it
is worth commenting on. I have no interest in your little battle with
Ron, or his with you. Since most of your reply to me was spent actually
replying to Ron, he has a point. And so do I, which is to ask you not to
use replies to me as a platform for tirades against any third parties.
The world in general is probably not interested in a catalog of all the
wrongs you have suffered.

[pnyikos]

Nobody made them. They were the result of a natural "abiogenesis,"
the spontaneous arising of living cells from prebiotic assemblages of
molecules.

On another thread, I am discussing something which is alleged to have
happened on earth, "the protein takeover":

http://groups.google.com/group/talk.origins/browse_thread/thread/b7969d55ebf5d18b#

I point out how little has been done to figure out how this huge step
towards the first prokaryote MIGHT have happened. We not only have no
clue as to what actually did happen (if it happened at all), we have
no idea of what kinds of steps are *capable of* making such a
development possible.

I say "if it happened at all" because I have an alternative
hypothesis, a sub-hypothesis of my main hypothesis that we owe our
existence to panspermists.

I talk about that sub-hypothesis in my second post to the above
thread. Here is the url for that post.

http://groups.google.com/group/talk.origins/msg/d829171ca3149dc6

[excerpt:]

This is the hypothesis that an intelligent life form evolved whose
cells were as described in what I said was the starting point for "the
last phase" (the protein takeover), and designed a protein-enzyme-
based life which it then distributed far and wide, one of its targets
being earth.

Quoting from the post to which you are replying:

The last phase starts with a "RNA world" in which most of the non-
protein players are already in place: DNA, ribosomes lacking
polypeptides, mRNA, aminoacyl-tRNA, and various ribozymes doing what
is nowadays done with protein enzymes. Especially crucial are
ribozymes for DNA replication, transcription, and reverse
transcription.

It may not be too difficult, given this apparatus, for proto-cells to
crank out some simple structural and "helper" proteins using a
translation scheme with a genetic code approximating the present one.

Proto-cells like this would be like the actual cells of this
hypothesized intelligent life form.

[end of excerpt]

Peter Nyikos

[Mark Isaak]

Sorry. That's shorthand for believing in a sudden miraculous creation
of the heavens and/or earth and the separate creation of two or more
humans with no remotely human precursors, much as it says in Genesis.

[Ron O]

All the lies about the wrongs that he hasn't suffered. He may have
suffered, but he deserved everything that he got.

Ron Okimoto

[John Harshman]

Don't care. Go away.

[pnyikos]

On Mar 23, 11:27 am, John Harshman <jharsh...@pacbell.net> wrote:
> pnyikos wrote:
> > Will you even reply to this post of mine, or will I find out on some
> > other thread that you didn't think anything in it was worth commenting
> > on?
>
> No, you will find out in this thread that I don't think anything in it
> is worth commenting on.

Not even to enlighten me about what the hell you meant by "common
courtesy" in this context, eh?

________begin repost______________

> Have to agree. And it's common courtesy too. Not just to Ron, but to me.

Since you obviously don't think it is common courtesy to reply to
every post someone makes in direct reply to you [see the two above
examples] I'd like to know what this "common courtesy" is all about,
and why it is a common courtesy to YOU.

=========== end of repost

> I have no interest in your little battle with
> Ron, or his with you.

"common courtesy...to me" seems to suggest otherwise: a personal
interest ("to me") in getting me to reply to the post to which Ron O
was demanding that I reply.

> Since most of your reply to me was spent actually
> replying to Ron, he has a point.

I never addressed him, only you, and I was letting you know how badly
you were being misled. Obviously, I had to refer to some of the
things he was saying.

> And so do I, which is to ask you not to
> use replies to me as a platform for tirades against any third parties.

So why were you so patient with Ron O's tirades against me? Why
didn't you tell him to address his allegations to me?

Some of those allegations, he never made directly to me, not even in
the post to which he is demanding that I reply.

> The world in general is probably not interested in a catalog of
> all the wrongs you have suffered.

Here is where you and I differ: if I were to see a clear case of
someone lying about you, I'd take him to task for it. I've done it
where Inez is concerned, for example, where Kleinman has lied about
her.

Kleinman seems to be lying about you now, but I'll have to read very
carefully to verify it. If you do catch him lying about you after
this, all you have to do is tell him he is lying about you, and why
what he says is a lie, and I will add my "voice" to yours unless you
ask me not to.

Peter Nyikos

[jillery]

What irony.

[John Harshman]

pnyikos wrote:
> On Mar 23, 11:27 am, John Harshman <jharsh...@pacbell.net> wrote:
>> pnyikos wrote:
>>> Will you even reply to this post of mine, or will I find out on some
>>> other thread that you didn't think anything in it was worth commenting
>>> on?
>> No, you will find out in this thread that I don't think anything in it
>> is worth commenting on.
>
> Not even to enlighten me about what the hell you meant by "common
> courtesy" in this context, eh?

Was that at all unclear? It's common courtesy when responding to one
poster not to fill that response with irrelevant material, specifically
including gratuitous attacks on other posters.

> So why were you so patient with Ron O's tirades against me? Why
> didn't you tell him to address his allegations to me?

I prefer to ignore him whenever possible.

> Some of those allegations, he never made directly to me, not even in
> the post to which he is demanding that I reply.

So reply to those allegations directly to him, not me.

>> The world in general is probably not interested in a catalog of
>> all the wrongs you have suffered.
>
> Here is where you and I differ: if I were to see a clear case of
> someone lying about you, I'd take him to task for it. I've done it
> where Inez is concerned, for example, where Kleinman has lied about
> her.

This is different, though. You and Ron have a mutual vendetta that it
would be best to keep out of. It would be best for you to keep out of it
too.

> Kleinman seems to be lying about you now, but I'll have to read very
> carefully to verify it. If you do catch him lying about you after
> this, all you have to do is tell him he is lying about you, and why
> what he says is a lie, and I will add my "voice" to yours unless you
> ask me not to.

It doesn't matter. Kleinman isn't fooling anyone. Anyway, he's the chief
victim of any deception here. His own, I mean.

[Frank J]

Why don't you ask them?

[pnyikos]

On Mar 23, 9:55 am, Frank J <f...@verizon.net> wrote:
> On Friday, March 2, 2012 4:35:53 PM UTC-5, Jason Spaceman wrote:
> > From the article:
> > ----------------------------------------------------------------
> > The publisher of an intelligent design book has decided to put
> > publication plans for the book on hold after some scientists
> > complained that such challenges to evolution theories should not be
> > presented in an academic publication.
>
> > International science publisher Springer had set the publication date
> > for Biological Information: New Perspectives for March 31. The
> > publishing house apparently began hearing complaints, though, after
> > Nick Matzke posted a Feb. 27 article titled, "Springer gets suckered
> > by creationist pseudoscience" on Panda's Thumb, a blog "critical of
> > the antievolution movement."

Also, as I found out, passionately opposed to the Intelligent Design

movement.

------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> > Read it athttp://www.christianpost.com/news/intelligent-design-book-meets-obsta...

> > or
> > http://tinyurl.com/6r5ro63
>
> > J. Spaceman
>
> Jason, I appreciate all the work you have done over the
> years at finding these articles, even if some of them have
> me pulling out my hair at how unreasonable science-deniers
>can be. But would it kill you to say "critics of pseudoscience"
> instead of "proponents of evolution"?

I don't know how appropriate that is in other articles Jason has,
found, but this case, you are simply taking the gossipy title of the
Panda's Thumb article at face value.

As a matter of fact, all the article and the spinoff have going for
them is a bunch of *ad hominems*. Nowhere in those two blogs can you
find anything out about the articles Nick Matzke labels
"pseudoscience" except the titles of a few articles and the names of
their authors and a few others.

And even for the *ad hominems*, the pickings are slim. I pointed this
out on the spinoff blog on March 5, one week after the article Jason
found for us was posted:

___________________________________

Fascinating, as Mr. Spock used to say. We now have a growing list of
people identified as authors in that manuscript submitted to Springer,
yet it’s like the mystery of the dog that didn’t bark in the night.
With the exception of Jorge Fernandez, information as to whether any
of the authors identified so far is a creationist is missing so far.

Here are the other authors, with # in front of their names, each
followed by either the person who documented it or the documentation.

#John W. Oller
A Masked Panda (F10Q) | March 1, 2012 1:27 PM

#Werner Gitt:
http://cjandhj.blogspot.com/2011/06[…]haca-ny.html

#Wesley Brewer:
A Masked Panda (F10Q) | March 1, 2012 12:58 PM

#Winston Ewert and George Montanez:
afarensis | March 1, 2012 1:44 PM |

Concerning the last two, there was a question about membership in
something that was not allowed on the Baylor campus, but even that
wasn’t unambiguously identified as creationist.

Instead, people here are making do with David Coppedge, whom Jorge
listed as merely an “attendee”, and Jorge himself.
===================== end of repost from page 2
of http://pandasthumb.org/archives/2012/02/update-on-sprin.html

To date, no new names have emerged; all that has happened is that on
the following day (March 6) someone who calls himself "diogeneslamp0"
claimed, without documentation, that Werner Gitt is a YEC creationist
and speculated on what Gitt's article might have contained.

There was one more comment to that blog, addressed to Jorge, the same
day. No activity whatsoever since then, and no sign of another
update.

Peter Nyikos
Professor, Dept. of Mathematics -- standard disclaimer--
University of South Carolina
http://www.math.sc.edu/~nyikos/
nyikos @ math.sc.edu

[pnyikos]

On Mar 7, 11:51 am, John Harshman <jharsh...@pacbell.net> wrote:
> pnyikos wrote:

> > On Mar 6, 11:01 am, John Harshman <jharsh...@pacbell.net> wrote:
> >> pnyikos wrote:

> >>> On Mar 3, 9:48 am, John Harshman <jharsh...@pacbell.net> wrote:
> >>>> pnyikos wrote:

> >>>>> On Mar 2, 9:33 pm, John Harshman <jharsh...@pacbell.net> wrote:
> >>>>>> pnyikos wrote:

> >>>>>>> The following excerpt is a lot more revealing than all the hooha:
> >>>>>>> _____________________________________________
> >>>>>>> A representative from Springer told Kaustuv Basu, a reporter for
> >>>>>>> Inside Higher Ed, that the company had decided to submit the
> >>>>>>> manuscript for additional peer review.
> >>>>>>> None of the critics have read the book. Their criticism is based upon
> >>>>>>> their knowledge of the authors and their ideas.

> >>> It now appears that none of the critics, including Nick Matzke [who
> >>> may be responsible for all the brouhaha] knew who the authors were.
> >>> Nick knew who the editors were, and wrongly conjectured that Sid
> >>> Galloway was an author, as well as conjecturing that John Sanford was
> >>> one[whether correctly or incorrectly, I do not know] in addition to
> >>> being an editor.  This was in the following article in the Panda's
> >>> Thumb site:
> >>>http://pandasthumb.org/archives/2012/02/springer-gets-s.html
> >>> Later, someone found out that Jorge Fernandez, who is alleged to be a
> >>> YEC, was one of the authors.
> >>> But now, in the comments people have been posting to an updated
> >>> article, the list of authors is beginning to emerge.

It stopped emerging. List deleted: it's the same one I posted in
reply to Frank J a couple of hours ago, in the copy of my post on page
2 of the following blog:

> >>>http://pandasthumb.org/archives/2012/02/update-on-sprin.html

> >>> Strangely enough, the usual gossip about them being creationists is
> >>> missing.
> >> Gossip? Why are you characterizing it that way?
>
> > Because that's what the original post and most of the 100+ comments on
> > it were:
>
> You will have to define "gossip" for me, because I don't see it.

I think you've been steeped in the milieu of anti-ID and anti-
creationism; you are like the fish who isn't aware of the water
because it is all around it.

The very title of the article is pure gossip:

"Springer gets suckered by creationist pseudoscience"

http://pandasthumb.org/archives/2012/02/springer-gets-s.html#comment-panels

See my reply to Frank J for just how far we are, almost a month later,
from verifying that any of it is creationist pseudoscience.

There is more, lots more of what I call gossip. Even in the article
itself, we read stuff like the word "fake" and speculating on what
went on in the conference, with nothing more than the names of the
editors (not the authors, at that point) to go on:

____________________________________________
It was basically just another fake ID “conference” where the ID fans
get together and convince each other that they are staging a
scientific revolution, all the while ignoring the actual science on
how new genetic “information” originates.

Here is one of the “diverse group of scientists” who attended and
reported on the event – Sid Galloway BS, M.Div., who I gather is the
Director of the Good Shepherd Initiative at www.soulcare.org, which is
devoted to “Education, Counseling, & Animal-Assisted Apologetics.”
Here’s his summary of the meeting (or his talk?).
==========================

As I wrote on page 4 of the following url, the answer to that question
is "Neither, it would seem".

> >http://pandasthumb.org/archives/2012/02/springer-gets-s.html

What the "summary" consisted of was a couple of extremely naive charts
by Galloway, who did not give a talk at the conference and was only
trying to let laypeople know his take on one aspect of the
conference. I quoted from Galloway's reaction to the flap that Matzke
began, and gave an url to Galloway's site, which has since been
revised by removal of the two charts.

> >   And now two people have started gossiping about me.  I've replied to
> > one, and am still debating whether to reply to the other.

I did. Both seem to have fallen silent.

> > The comments in the wake of the later "update" article are much more
> > restrained, on the whole.

...but minimal; see my reply to Frank J for details.

Peter Nyikos

[John Harshman]

Yes. And?

> http://pandasthumb.org/archives/2012/02/springer-gets-s.html#comment-panels
>
> See my reply to Frank J for just how far we are, almost a month later,
> from verifying that any of it is creationist pseudoscience.

Really, even when we've been shown a graph of lifespans of the
patriarchs following the flood?

> There is more, lots more of what I call gossip. Even in the article
> itself, we read stuff like the word "fake" and speculating on what
> went on in the conference, with nothing more than the names of the
> editors (not the authors, at that point) to go on:
>
> ____________________________________________
> It was basically just another fake ID “conference” where the ID fans
> get together and convince each other that they are staging a
> scientific revolution, all the while ignoring the actual science on
> how new genetic “information” originates.

Isn't that what the evidence suggests? Do you think it was a real
scientific conference?

> Here is one of the “diverse group of scientists” who attended and
> reported on the event – Sid Galloway BS, M.Div., who I gather is the
> Director of the Good Shepherd Initiative at www.soulcare.org, which is
> devoted to “Education, Counseling, & Animal-Assisted Apologetics.”
> Here’s his summary of the meeting (or his talk?).
> ==========================
>
> As I wrote on page 4 of the following url, the answer to that question
> is "Neither, it would seem".

>>> http://pandasthumb.org/archives/2012/02/springer-gets-s.html
>
> What the "summary" consisted of was a couple of extremely naive charts
> by Galloway, who did not give a talk at the conference and was only
> trying to let laypeople know his take on one aspect of the
> conference. I quoted from Galloway's reaction to the flap that Matzke
> began, and gave an url to Galloway's site, which has since been
> revised by removal of the two charts.
>
>>> And now two people have started gossiping about me. I've replied to
>>> one, and am still debating whether to reply to the other.
>
> I did. Both seem to have fallen silent.
>
>>> The comments in the wake of the later "update" article are much more
>>> restrained, on the whole.
>
> ...but minimal; see my reply to Frank J for details.

Once the disappear off the front page, they attract less discussion. If
you're suggesting a conspiracy of silence, I doubt it. When there's more
information, an update will doubtless appear.

[pnyikos]

> >http://pandasthumb.org/archives/2012/02/springer-gets-s.html#comment-...

>
> > See my reply to Frank J for just how far we are, almost a month later,
> > from verifying that any of it is creationist pseudoscience.
>
> Really, even when we've been shown a graph of lifespans of the
> patriarchs following the flood?

Where? by whom? What connection does this have with the conference,
or its proceedings?

> > There is more, lots more of what I call gossip.  Even in the article
> > itself, we read stuff like the word "fake" and speculating on what
> > went on in the conference, with nothing more than the names of the
> > editors (not the authors, at that point) to go on:
>
> > ____________________________________________
> > It was basically just another fake ID “conference” where the ID fans
> > get together and convince each other that they are staging a
> > scientific revolution, all the while ignoring the actual science on
> > how new genetic “information” originates.
>
> Isn't that what the evidence suggests?

The names of the editors and a few authors and a few titles? In
what way are do they "ignore" the actual science, and why are you sure
that applies to this conference?

I doubt that they do it as blatantly as Alan Kleinman keeps doing.

>Do you think it was a real scientific conference?

I'm suspending judgment till I learn more. At the rate things are
going, I will have to wait until the Springer publishers make some
sort of public announcement.

> > Here is one of the “diverse group of scientists” who attended and
> > reported on the event – Sid Galloway BS, M.Div., who I gather is the

> > Director of the Good Shepherd Initiative atwww.soulcare.org, which is

> > devoted to “Education, Counseling, & Animal-Assisted Apologetics.”
> > Here’s his summary of the meeting (or his talk?).
> > ==========================
>
> > As I wrote on page 4 of the following url, the answer to that question
> > is "Neither, it would seem".
> >>>http://pandasthumb.org/archives/2012/02/springer-gets-s.html
>
> > What the "summary" consisted of was a couple of extremely naive charts
> > by Galloway, who did not give a talk at the conference and was only
> > trying to let laypeople know his take on one aspect of the
> > conference.  I quoted from Galloway's reaction to the flap that Matzke
> > began, and gave an url to Galloway's site, which has since been
> > revised by removal of the two charts.
>
> >>>   And now two people have started gossiping about me.  I've replied to
> >>> one, and am still debating whether to reply to the other.
>
> > I did.  Both seem to have fallen silent.
>
> >>> The comments in the wake of the later "update" article are much more
> >>> restrained, on the whole.
>
> > ...but minimal; see my reply to Frank J for details.
>
> Once the disappear off the front page, they attract less discussion. If
> you're suggesting a conspiracy of silence, I doubt it.

Nope. Just an inability of some highly motivated anti-ID zealots to
come up with any real evidence of "pseudoscience" being hawked at the
conference or in the proceedings.

> When there's more
> information, an update will doubtless appear.-

I'll be looking for it.

Peter Nyikos