What happened to TO

[RonO]

The latest Nyikosian fiasco has made it clear that most regular posters
(with exceptions to most of the IDiots) do not know what happened on TO
for more than 5 years. It is apparent that most of you blame me for
driving away all the IDiotic type creationists. You seem to think that
I did it with some type of lame harassment involving some imagined
refutation of the ID perp's Top Six that they bestowed upon the IDiot
rubes back in Nov. 2017. I did not realize that this was the common
belief. It seems really stupid for anyone to think that, when the
god-of-the-gaps denial junk that makes up the Top Six have been standard
creationist stupidity for around half a century. They are just the same
god-of-the-gaps junk that were part of the Gish gallop. They existed
when the Supreme Court told the creationists that such gap denial
arguments were not worth calling any type of science worth teaching in
the public schools, and that they were very poor support for the
creationist beliefs. Just because Science didn't have all the answers,
did not mean that the creationist alternative was the actual
explanation. That refutation hadn't been able to stop their continued
use since the 1987 decision. What could I have possibly done that would
have refuted them in any way to make the IDiots quit the ID scam?

The ID perps had been using them for over 20 years by the time that they
put them up as the Top Six best IDiotic evidence for the creationist ID
scam. They even informed the rubes that their effort was the first time
that they had ever done anything so stupid. They had refused to do it
for over 20 years, but someone screwed up, and did what should have
never been done.

I was disappointed in Mark because he obviously hadn't bothered to
figure out how wrong he had been, and had, had the oppoortunity to
correct his misconception when I had to put up this thread.

https://groups.google.com/g/talk.origins/c/cY2JbNjBLwE/m/gPLieQgEBQAJ

The link below is a typical Top Six thread that demonstrates that even
the other ID perps could not deal with the Top Six in an honest and
straightforward manner.

https://groups.google.com/g/talk.origins/c/a2K79skPGXI/m/uDwx0i-_BAAJ

What the ID perps claimed about the Top Six:
https://evolutionnews.org/2017/11/ids-top-six-the-origin-of-the-universe/

QUOTE:
Editor’s note: In the past we’ve offered the top 10 problems with
Darwinian evolution (see here for a fuller elaboration), and the top
five problems with origin-of-life theories. But somehow we neglected to
offer a parallel listing of the top lines of evidence supporting
intelligent design. Many different pieces of evidence pointing to design
in nature could be adduced, but we decided to distill it all down to six
major lines of evidence. Sure, five or ten would have been more
conventional, but when did ID advocates start playing to expectations?

So here they are, their order simply reflecting that in which they must
logically have occurred within our universe. Material is adapted from
the textbook Discovering Intelligent Design, which is an excellent
resource for introducing the evidence for ID, along with Stephen Meyer’s
books Signature in the Cell and Darwin’s Doubt.
END QUOTE:

You can see the Editor admitting that they had never done something that
stupid before, and not considering why it had never been done before the
group of IDiots responsible for the effort did it anyway. Luskin may
have been the editor. In other descriptions of the Top Six Luskin
claims that others were responsible for some of the content of the Top
Six, but they are not specifically named as authors.

The reason that it had never been done before is likely the reason why
the TO IDiots quit the ID scam. The Top Six has traditionally been sold
to the rubes as independent bits of denial. All the IDiotic type
creationists back to the Scientific Creationists have only used the Top
Six for gap denial purposes. None of them have ever tried to use them
to build anything positive. The ID perps made the stupid mistake of
telling the rubes that the Top Six are presented in "their order simply
reflecting that in which they must logically have occurred within our
universe." The majority of IDiot rubes have always been YEC, but even
most of the OEC IDiots like they have at Reason To Believe can't deal
with the Top Six. They were never meant to form any context in which
they all could be evaluated in relation to each other. Most Biblical
creationists do not want to believe in the god that fills the Top Six gaps.

The ID perps at the Discovery Institute are the ones responsible for the
demise of the ID scam on TO. In response to the Top Six Bill claimed
that he had never supported the creationist ID scam. Bill is the
creationist who had claimed that he knew some real ID scientists that
had some real ID science, but he never told us who they were. What Bill
likely meant was that he had never supported the ID scam as it had
always existed. Pagano was still posting when the Top Six came out and
he claimed that they were bogus and were not the best evidence for ID.
The Top Six do not support a geocentric universe. Pagano tried to claim
that Dembski's nonsense was better, but Dembski had retired from the ID
scam years before as an abject failure, and none of his junk had made it
into the Top Six. Pagano quit posting. Nyikos was MIA at the time that
the Top Six came out, but Glenn and Kalk both ran from them and they
started a stupid campaign of putting up the second rate junk that the ID
perps were still putting out instead of deal with the Top Six. Kalkidas
couldn't keep doing that to himself so he finally claimed that he was no
longer an IDiot, and also came out as not being Hindu, and is now just a
plain vanilla biblical creationist. Glenn kept putting up the second
rate junk for around 5 years, but he seems to have quit doing it after
putting up 4 Top Six topics by accident within a week. That seemed to
demonstrate that Glenn didn't care enough about what he was posting to
understand that they were gap denial topics that he had been running
from for half a decade.

Nyikos finally got involved with the Top Six after Glenn's posting
fiasco, and claimed that I was not refuting the Top Six. Nyikos
obviously did not have a clue about why all the other IDiots had quit
the ID scam. I had to tell Nyikos that I had never tried to refute the
Top Six. Wouldn't it be some type of miracle if I had come up with some
effective refutation that would destroy half a century of denial on the
subject? I had just kept presenting them as the ID perps had presented
them, and it was the IDiots that could not stand to deal with them as
the Top Six in their order of occurrence. As sad as it may be Nyikos
started lying about the Top Six, so we can expect him to lie about it
forever after. Nyikos did try to reconcile the Top Six with directed
panspermia, and ended up destroying the notion of space aliens and
replacing them with god like beings that could be responsible for the
Big Bang and fine tuning, and the huge time span between events.

It should be evident to everyone that the ID perps destroyed the
creationist ID scam on TO. It may have been one of the most significant
events in relation to biblical creationism that has ever occurred on TO
and everyone but the IDiots (except for Nyikos) seemed to understand
what happened when it first happened. The Top Six likely destroyed any
notion that there was any ID science that any IDiots wanted to support.
The NCSE should have made an issue out of it because it is obvious that
there are no IDiotic type creationists that are willing to teach the Top
Six to their kids in their order of occurrence. The designer
responsible for the Top Six is not the designer of their Bible. If you
do not want to teach the best evidence why should you teach anything at all?

How many IDiot creationists would stand to have their children taught
that over 13 billion years ago some intelligent designer created the
universe with a big bang (#1) and that the universe has been expanding
ever since. Before or during the Big Bang the intelligent designer fine
tuned the universe to be what it is. After waiting around 8 billion
years for the elements that make up our solar system to be created, by
generations of dying stars, the intelligent designer fine tuned our
solar system so that the earth was composed of the elements it needed to
support life, had a magnetic field, was just the right size and had just
the right orbit around the sun around 4.5 billion years ago (#2).
Around 3.8 billion years ago this designer was responsible for the
origin of life (#3). For over 2 billion years the intelligent designer
was satisfied with evolving microbial lifeforms, and probably over a
billion years ago the designer created the flagellum in some of these
microbes out of already existing parts by putting 3 neutral mutations in
the structure, within a certain period of time, in order to evolve some
essential flagellar function, and make the flagellum into an irreducibly
complex system (#4). It took a while, but eventually multicellular
animals started to evolve. Sometime after bilateral animals came into
existence the intelligent designer was responsible for the
diversification of bilateria that occurred within a 25 million year
period of time over half a billion years ago and is responsible for the
Cambrian explosion (#5). This same designer is responsible for for
filling the gaps in the human fossil record over the last 10 million
years (#6). What is weird about the last one is that as we figure out
what actually happened the number of gaps that the designer has to fill
have just been multiplying, and the multimillion year time period has
just been further refined.

The NCSE should point out what the Top Six means, and disabuse the
IDiots of the notion that they ever wanted to teach the junk in the
public schools. If you aren't going to teach the best, why would you
want to teach anything at all? It is pretty obvious why the ID perps
never produced a public school lesson plan for teaching IDiocy. The Big
Bang has already been one of the topics that the IDiotic type
creationists have been able to remove from the public school science
standards in Kansas. IDiot type creathionists don't want their kids to
hear anything about the Big Bang.

The ID perps are claiming that the Top Six is the best evidence that
they have supporting the ID scam, but there doesn't seem to be very many
IDiot rubes that want to believe in the designer that fills those gaps.
The Top Six makes creationists understand what the Supreme Court meant
when they stated that just because Science doesn't have the answer, that
lack of understanding does not support the creationist alternative. The
Top Six definitely do not support YEC biblical beliefs. The OEC IDiots
at Reason to Believe have had to "reinterpret" the Bible in order to
attempt to make the Bible consistent with the Top Six.

The TO IDiots quit the ID scam because they finally understood that they
had never wanted the ID perps to succeed in producing any valid ID
science. Any such science would just be more for them to deny. There
was no longer any reason to keep supporting the creationist ID scam. ID
perps like Denton and Behe have likely understood this from the
beginning of the modern ID creationist scam. They have consistently
told the rubes that any IDiotic science wasn't going to change what we
already understood about nature.

Science is just the best way that we have figured out to determine what
nature actually is. The ID perps and even IDiots have understood that
fact since the beginning. That is why they call it intelligent design
science. They wanted to lie about being able to have that success for
themselves. They have been able to lie to themselves that ID creation
science would amount to anything that would significantly change what we
have already figured out, but the Top Six basically ends any sane belief
in that regard.

Just imagine what would happen if Behe identified his 3 neutral
mutations that had to occur within a specified amount of time in order
to create a significant fucntional part of the flagellum so that the
flagellum would be his type of IC. Behe would know what had existed
before, and he would know how those systems had changed, and he would
have a good idea of when that occurred. The majority of IDiots would
deny that such a thing ever happened over a billion years ago. Most
IDiots never wanted Behe to succeed in doing any ID science.

The same goes for Meyer's Cambrian explosion gap denial. Meyer makes a
big deal about our ability in recent times to reduce the time period
estimate for the length of the Cambrian explosion from a 45 million year
period to a 25 million year period over half a billion years ago. If
Meyer had ever been able to determine what his designer had done in
those 25 million years the majority of IDiots would have denied the science.

IDiot type creationists already want to drop the Big Bang out of public
school science standards. There really was never any ID science that
the rubes wanted the ID perps to accomplish.

It is likely not too late to understand what actually happened.
Ignorance on this subject should not exist on TO. You can still try to
get Kalk or Bill to tell you if I ever needed to refute the Top Six in
any way. All that I ever did was present them just the way that the ID
perps had presented them, and point out that even the ID perps could not
deal with them in an honest and straightforward manner.

Ron Okimoto

[erik simpson]

With regard to Nyikos, forget about the Top Six, Rubes and Perps and all that.
Just ignore him, evict him from your head. It's easy, trust me.

[RonO]

The relevant thing Nyikos has to do with this is that he instigated the
exposure of the misperception of the regulars on TO about this issue,
and some still want to keep those misconceptions. How sad would it be
if some of them maintained their ignorance just becausse they want to
keep Nyikos around? Nyikos is actually proof that I did not attempt any
refutation, because Nyikos noted that I was not refuting the Top Six,
and I had to tell him that I had never tried to refute the Top Six.
IDiotic type creationism essentially died on TO, and it wasn't me that
did it. Blaming me just means that some of them never want to
understand what happened. It likely was one of the most significant
events that ever happened on TO with respect to biblical creationism,
and they all missed it. Really, what kind of refutation of the Top Six
could I have ever developed that would make Kalkidas quit being an
IDiot, and admit that he was not Hindu? Has my accurate description of
ID as a scam and the perpetrators as perps ever dissuaded Kalk before?
The bait and switch has been going down for over 20 years, and the ID
perps run the scam on their own creationist support base. They only use
ID as the bait, but only give the rubes the switch scam. The Top Six
should tell any creationist rube that there was never any ID science
that they would have ever wanted to teach. The obsfuscation and denial
switch scam that the ID perps claim has nothing to do with ID is all
that the ID perps ever had to give them. The IDiots didn't quit the ID
scam because of any refutation that I thought up. They quit because
they realized that they had never wanted to support the junk in the
first place.

All that I ever had to do was present the Top Six as the ID perps had
presented them to the rubes. Nyikos doesn't need to be any
consideration in anyone's decision to remain ignorant or understand
something about a major turning point in TO. The ID perps shot
themselves in the head and killed ID on TO over 5 years ago, and it
seems that the regulars have just been pretending that, that didn't happen.

Ron Okimoto

[jillery]

Your comments below might comfort your ego, but they almost certainly
will stop you from learning anything valid from the experience.

--
You're entitled to your own opinions.
You're not entitled to your own facts.

[RonO]

On 6/4/2023 7:38 AM, jillery wrote:
> Your comments below might comfort your ego, but they almost certainly
> will stop you from learning anything valid from the experience.

Doesn't this apply to you?

Do you understand what happened or do you refuse to acknowledge reality?

My guess is that the ex IDiots are laughing at you right now. The fact
that most of the TO regulars seem to have missed out on the event is
likely the only positive thing that has come out of it for them. I
never had to harass the IDiots with any lame refutation of the Top Six.
I just had to keep reminding a couple of the willfully ignorant about
what they were running from. The rest quit when they first came out.

Ron Okimoto

[jillery]

On Sun, 4 Jun 2023 13:34:07 -0500, RonO <roki...@cox.net> wrote:

>On 6/4/2023 7:38 AM, jillery wrote:
>> Your comments below might comfort your ego, but they almost certainly
>> will stop you from learning anything valid from the experience.
>
>Doesn't this apply to you?
>
>Do you understand what happened or do you refuse to acknowledge reality?
>
>My guess is that the ex IDiots are laughing at you right now. The fact
>that most of the TO regulars seem to have missed out on the event is
>likely the only positive thing that has come out of it for them. I
>never had to harass the IDiots with any lame refutation of the Top Six.
>I just had to keep reminding a couple of the willfully ignorant about
>what they were running from. The rest quit when they first came out.
>
>Ron Okimoto

IDiots might appear to you to have quit the T.O. battlefield, but they
have moved on to new media recruiting new allies using new strategies.
Don't let your bitterness blind you to these facts.

[peter2...@gmail.com]

On Saturday, June 3, 2023 at 10:25:42 AM UTC-4, RonO wrote:
> The latest Nyikosian fiasco

... by yourself, it would seem: nothing has happened on the thread where you
posted something that you allegedly sent DIG since I replied to you on Friday (June 2),
and you don't even say what the fiasco YOU are alleging is all about.

Moreover, you posted an incredibly naive comment about
me below, that I have never seen before.

> has made it clear that most regular posters
> (with exceptions to most of the IDiots) do not know what happened on TO
> for more than 5 years. It is apparent that most of you blame me for
> driving away all the IDiotic type creationists.

Who did you think of as fitting this category? Glenn, Dale, qKalkidas, Ron Dean,
and Freon Bill are still around, although they post more sporadically.

Then there was Dr.Dr. Kleinman, whom you successfully got DIG
to ban. Are none of the above "IDiotic type creationists" according to you?

> You seem to think that
> I did it with some type of lame harassment involving some imagined

> refutation of the ID perp's Top Six that they bestowed upon the IDiot o

> rubes back in Nov. 2017.

Who is "You" here? none of the people who have responded to you
(including me, now) has shown any sign of having thought anything like this.

>I did not realize that this was the common belief.

What made you change your mind?

<snip for focus>

>
> Nyikos finally got involved with the Top Six after Glenn's posting
> fiasco, and claimed that I was not refuting the Top Six. Nyikos
> obviously did not have a clue about why all the other IDiots had quit
> the ID scam.

As you can see from what I wrote above, I still have no clue as to what
you think you are talking about here.

> I had to tell Nyikos that I had never tried to refute the
> Top Six.

What you had to do was to *belatedly* enter a thread which I had set up
to challenge people to *either* support *or* argue against any of
the "top six." And what you told me that you didn't want anyone
to do EITHER of these things. I was greatly puzzled and had to ask
you what your purpose was in posting from time to time about the
top six. Your answer was a tortuous variation on what you wrote
below after a silly comment that is based on the statement that I have corrected.

>Wouldn't it be some type of miracle if I had come up with some
> effective refutation that would destroy half a century of denial on the
> subject? I had just kept presenting them as the ID perps had presented
> them, and it was the IDiots that could not stand to deal with them as
> the Top Six in their order of occurrence. As sad as it may be Nyikos
> started lying about the Top Six, so we can expect him to lie about it
> forever after.

As usual, "lying" is just a word that you use without daring to quote
or even describe what the alleged lying consisted of.


Now comes the comment that I called "incredibly naive" near
the beginning of this post:

> Nyikos did try to reconcile the Top Six with directed
> panspermia, and ended up destroying the notion of space aliens and
> replacing them with god like beings that could be responsible for the
> Big Bang and fine tuning, and the huge time span between events.

This was so ignorant and so wrongheaded that I decided to
start a thread to correct it:

https://groups.google.com/g/talk.origins/c/eBpGygILdmc/m/RnrUFz5RAwAJ
Correcting Misconceptions About My ID Theory
Jun 5, 2023, 4:05:43 PM

I didn't mention your name on it so far, nor did I link your OP. Here is what I wrote
about your benighted statement.

[QUOTE:]
The following huge misconception was posted two days ago on the OP of
"What happened to TO".

"Nyikos did try to reconcile the Top Six with directed panspermia, and ended up destroying the notion of space aliens and replacing them with god like beings that could be responsible for the Big Bang and fine tuning, and the huge time span between events."

In reality, my ID theory includes six different hypotheses through
that time span, and may come to include more. Except for three
hypotheses on directed panspermia (DP), they are all fully compatible
with, and independent of, each other. This applies, of course, to the
two examples [four, to be precise] given in the part that I have quoted.
[END OF QUOTE]

I later realized that the hypothesis about "god like beings" was really
two incompatible ones, the Deist and the Theist. I explained that here:

https://groups.google.com/g/talk.origins/c/eBpGygILdmc/m/0rnMnVZbAwAJ
Re: Correcting Misconceptions About My ID Theory
Jun 5, 2023, 7:10:44 PM

If you would like for me to identify you as the author, I will gladly oblige.
Also, you are welcome to join the thread if you so wish.


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

PS you keep talking about ONE designer where I theorize FOUR different
designers, three of whom are what you call "space aliens" who
are very different from each other since each is at least one gigayear
later than the earlier one[s]. Also each of the "space aliens" is really a team,
not a single individual, although it is possible (but unlikely) that the design
was the brainchild of one genius.

[Ron Dean]

peter2...@gmail.com wrote:
> On Saturday, June 3, 2023 at 10:25:42 AM UTC-4, RonO wrote:
>> The latest Nyikosian fiasco
>
> ... by yourself, it would seem: nothing has happened on the thread where you
> posted something that you allegedly sent DIG since I replied to you on Friday (June 2),
> and you don't even say what the fiasco YOU are alleging is all about.
>
> Moreover, you posted an incredibly naive comment about
> me below, that I have never seen before.
>
>
>> has made it clear that most regular posters
>> (with exceptions to most of the IDiots) do not know what happened on TO
>> for more than 5 years. It is apparent that most of you blame me for
>> driving away all the IDiotic type creationists.
>
> Who did you think of as fitting this category? Glenn, Dale, qKalkidas, Ron Dean,
> and Freon Bill are still around, although they post more sporadically.
>

Frankly, I never quite understood Ron O's obsession with the so called
Top Six evidence for Intelligent Design. Why the neurotic behavior
and bizarre attitude towards those of us with whom he disagrees and
mentions by name?
Why does he deliberately and purposefully rain slanders and insults
down on us by name calling IE: IDiots, YEC RUBES, OEC etc?
It's obvious he has problems with the Top Six, (that's fine) but rather
than address and falsify these "messages" he takes the easy way out and
shoots those of us he considers messengers.

[RonO]

As is being noted by the clueless in denial, several of the IDiots did
not quit posting, they just quit the ID scam. Kalk and Bill still post
from time to time, they just quit being IDiots. Pagano was the only
IDiot that quit posting. I don't know why you keep going on about the
clueless that are still going on about this junk outside of TO.
Ignorance survives all over. There is nothing that I can do about it,
and I never claimed to have done anything about it. Look at Dean, he
has always been clueless about this subject. He asked the IDiotic, and
ex IDiotic creationists to help him understand what was up with the Top
Six, but no one ever helped him out. He made that request twice. The
second time after claiming to have forgotten what happened the first
time that he didn't understand what the issue with the Top Six was. He
subsequently claimed that he did not recall the previous failures in
understanding what was going on with the Top Six and is currently
admitting that he never did have a clue.

What I did claim in what you have deleted is that the NCSE should have
started to use it as I did. The majority of IDiot rubes that want to
teach creationism in the public schools would run from the Top Six.
There is no way that they would want to teach the best evidence for ID
creationism the way in which it was presented by the ID perps. Some of
the other ID perps can't even stand them as they were originally
presented. Sewell had to drop out IC (#4) and the Cambrian explosion
(#5) and place them out of order of occurrence. Miller had to drop out
the Big Bang (#1). The IDiotic type creationists that want to teach
creationism in the public schools have already tried to drop the Big
Bang out of the public school science standards in several states, and
they succeeded in Kansas for a while. There really isn't any way that
they would want to teach the Top Six as the best evidences for IDiocy in

"their order simply reflecting that in which they must logically have

occurred within our universe." If you are not going to teach the best,

why would you want to teach anything at all?

Ron Okimoto

[Ron Dean]

What you were missing or else deliberately twisted was my failure to
understand your issue. I accepted the fact that you disagreed with the
Top Six. OK that's fine, but why did _you_ not attempt to discredit of
disprove the Top SIX. (could it be that you could not) Instead you
engaged in slander and name calling.
Point Is: you do not win friends a _influence_ people by such asinine
behavior as you exhibited. Of course, it wasn't your intention to enter
into a rational discussion for the purpose of convincing people with
whom you disagree of their errors wrong-headness.

[peter2...@gmail.com]

On Tuesday, June 6, 2023 at 5:15:45 PM UTC-4, Ron Dean wrote:
> peter2...@gmail.com wrote:
> > On Saturday, June 3, 2023 at 10:25:42 AM UTC-4, RonO wrote:
> >> The latest Nyikosian fiasco
> >
> > ... by yourself, it would seem: nothing has happened on the thread where you
> > posted something that you allegedly sent DIG since I replied to you on Friday (June 2),
> > and you don't even say what the fiasco YOU are alleging is all about.
> >
> > Moreover, you posted an incredibly naive comment about
> > me below, that I have never seen before.
> >
> >
> >> has made it clear that most regular posters
> >> (with exceptions to most of the IDiots) do not know what happened on TO
> >> for more than 5 years. It is apparent that most of you blame me for
> >> driving away all the IDiotic type creationists.

I'm more concerned about how Ron O and his kind have driven away
dozens of NON-creationists from talk.origins with their unfair and nasty
behavior towards various posters who are more decent than Ron O and his kind are.

> > Who did you think of as fitting this category? Glenn, Dale, Kalkidas, Ron Dean,

> > and Freon Bill are still around, although they post more sporadically.
> >
> Frankly, I never quite understood Ron O's obsession with the so called
> Top Six evidence for Intelligent Design. Why the neurotic behavior
> and bizarre attitude towards those of us with whom he disagrees and
> mentions by name?

He is pampered by the anti-ID people who dominate talk.origins.
He does a lot of "dirty work" which they find distasteful, but it makes
their life easier. Most of them are not the least bit interested in
whether his torrential allegations of "lying" or "senseless harassment" are
true or false, as long as he doesn't go too berserk.

Ron O overstepped that line back in March, when he made such
dire threats to ask the talk.origins moderator, David Iain Greig
(commonly called DIG) to ban me, that one anti-ID person after
another tried to get him to calm down. No matter how much some
of them dislike me, they know that I am not a clown like Dr. Dr. Kleinman was,
and many do have a grudging respect for the way I make them think.

> Why does he deliberately and purposefully rain slanders and insults
> down on us by name calling IE: IDiots, YEC RUBES, OEC etc?
> It's obvious he has problems with the Top Six, (that's fine) but rather
> than address and falsify these "messages" he takes the easy way out and
> shoots those of us he considers messengers.

He has severe psychological problems. One of them is to take accusations
that stung him (because they are true) and decide they are dandy
things to hit his opponents with ad infinitum and ad nauseam (whether
or not they are true -- in my case, never true). Examples
include: sadistic, maniac, and "Projection is a way of life for you."

> >
> > Then there was Dr.Dr. Kleinman, whom you successfully got DIG
> > to ban. Are none of the above "IDiotic type creationists" according to you?

To continue the above narrative: he must have had this success go to his head,
because after almost two months of not interacting with him, I criticized him in May
for the asinine way he talked about Dr. James Tour "wallowing in denial" the
way he talks about IDiots below. Here is where I did it:

https://groups.google.com/g/talk.origins/c/khZM_6plMSc/m/TaE2hHZDAQAJ
Re: Clueless

Ron O went on the warpath, saying I had been warned not to continue
my "assoholic harassment" of him, and that if I did not ask DIG to
ban me from talk.origins by Wednesday May 31, he would do it "for me".
He even claimed on Thursday June 1 that he had done it, but the
alleged email to DIG was so deranged that I suspect it is a hoax.
Here is how I replied to the post where he displayed it:

https://groups.google.com/g/talk.origins/c/rpIkQn-ZztE/m/iEmYSzx6AgAJ
Re: email sent to David Greig
Jun 2, 2023, 10:25:40 PM

For sure, DIG has not responded.


Peter Nyikos

[RonO]

You still do not get that I never disagreed with the Top Six. The other
creationists quit the ID scam because they could not deal with the god
that fit into the Top Six gaps in their order of occurrence. Why didn't
you read the initial post in this thread?

I thought that you had finally gotten what all the others had when you
admitted that you did not want to understand how the Top Six fit into
your religious beliefs and you quit arguing. Just think of why you use
the god-of-the-gaps denial. You use them to support your religious
beliefs. Probably any other reason and you are just lying to yourself.
That is how biblical creationists have been using the Top Six since they
were part of the Gish Gallop. The only reason for putting them up is to
claim that we do not know what happened so some god did it. What you
need to do is put your god in all the gaps and see if you really want to
use them. None of the others wanted to build anything positive out of
the gap denial. The god that fills the Top Six gaps is not biblical
enough for most biblical creationists.

Read the first post in this thread. About half way down you will come
to what none of them could deal with. Starting with the Big Bang that
happened over 13 billion years ago. The Top Six have been traditionally
given to the rubes as independent bits of gap denial, but the ID perps
made the mistake of putting them together and told the rubes that they
were in "their order simply reflecting that in which they must logically
have occurred within our universe." Biblical creationists have
traditionally used them as independent bits of denial that you are
supposed to forget about one as you move onto the other. Most of the TO
IDiots could not do that when they were given as the best that they had
and in their order of occurrence.

Some ID perps like Behe and Denton can deal with the Top Six in their
order of occurrence. They both realize that biological evolution is a
fact of nature and that the universe has evolved as well. Life has been
changing on this planet for billions of years. Meyer makes a big deal
about the Cambrian explosion (#5 of the Top Six) occurring within a 25
million year period over half a billion years ago. He claims that 25
million years is not enough time for something like that to happen, but
the evidence is that it did happen before or during that period of time.
Denton has been telling the rubes, for years before the Top Six came
out, that his designer got the ball rolling by creating the Big Bang,
and it has all unfolded into what we have today. You need to confront
the Top Six and see if you can deal with them, or have to run from them
like the TO IDiots had to do. Kalk quit the ID scam rather than have
the Top Six as the best evidence that he had. Bill claimed that he had
never supported the ID scam.

I never had to disagree with the Top Six nor try to refute them in any
way. All that I did was put them up as the ID perps had given them to
the rubes. The other creationists never helped you out in understanding
what they understood. Do you need any more help on the subject.

Ron Okimoto

[jillery]

On Tue, 6 Jun 2023 17:53:59 -0500, RonO <roki...@cox.net> wrote:

>On 6/5/2023 11:31 PM, jillery wrote:
>> On Sun, 4 Jun 2023 13:34:07 -0500, RonO <roki...@cox.net> wrote:
>>
>>> On 6/4/2023 7:38 AM, jillery wrote:
>>>> Your comments below might comfort your ego, but they almost certainly
>>>> will stop you from learning anything valid from the experience.
>>>
>>> Doesn't this apply to you?
>>>
>>> Do you understand what happened or do you refuse to acknowledge reality?
>>>
>>> My guess is that the ex IDiots are laughing at you right now. The fact
>>> that most of the TO regulars seem to have missed out on the event is
>>> likely the only positive thing that has come out of it for them. I
>>> never had to harass the IDiots with any lame refutation of the Top Six.
>>> I just had to keep reminding a couple of the willfully ignorant about
>>> what they were running from. The rest quit when they first came out.
>>>
>>> Ron Okimoto
>>
>>
>> IDiots might appear to you to have quit the T.O. battlefield, but they
>> have moved on to new media recruiting new allies using new strategies.
>> Don't let your bitterness blind you to these facts.
>>
>
>As is being noted by the clueless in denial, several of the IDiots did
>not quit posting, they just quit the ID scam. Kalk and Bill still post
>from time to time, they just quit being IDiots.

How do you come to these conclusions?

>Pagano was the only
>IDiot that quit posting. I don't know why you keep going on about the
>clueless that are still going on about this junk outside of TO.
>Ignorance survives all over. There is nothing that I can do about it,
>and I never claimed to have done anything about it.

... and I never claim you claimed...

More to the point, neither way informs my point. You're playing word
games again.

Discotut's "Top Six" is a list of their own intelligent design. As I
and others have documented over several years, Discotut isn't the only
authority, nevermind the final authority, wrt evolution denial and/or
ID. You would know this if you weren't obsessively focused on their
"Top Six".

[David Greig]

On 2023-06-06, peter2...@gmail.com <peter2...@gmail.com> wrote:
> On Saturday, June 3, 2023 at 10:25:42 AM UTC-4, RonO wrote:
>> The latest Nyikosian fiasco
>
> ... by yourself, it would seem: nothing has happened on the thread where you
> posted something that you allegedly sent DIG since I replied to you on Friday (June 2),

Confirmed, just to save you typing "allegedly" henceforth.

> and you don't even say what the fiasco YOU are alleging is all about.

I see a few of you angryposting at each other for some reason I haven't quite
grasped except you all this the other(s) are lying about things.

If all of you could lower the temperature? I'm guessing the accusations have
been pretty much hashed out at this point and nobody's going to change their
views. While not taking anyone's side, it's impenetrable, nobody not already
engaged is going to read massive posts detailing why Poster X lied about
something, so maybe just let it all go? Having spent a number of years in US
political forums, it took me realizing that I was way overcommitted about
relatively small points of disagreement where I'd end up practically screaming
at someone for nothing. I sense this is at that level.

I will point out to the assembled that Peter is also mildly USENET famous
for his posting skills since the era of the Great Renaming and abortion
flamewars.

You all air out the particular subject? Great, please move on, it's disrupting
what little is left of the group. Pretty please, with sugar on it.

Killfile each other already.

--D.

--
david iain greig dgr...@ediacara.org
moderator, talk.origins sp4 kox
http://www.ediacara.org/~dgreig arbor plena alouattarum

[RonO]

I thank you for responding to this post. Did you recieve my emails on
this subject?

Shouldn't you ask Nyikos if he has any examples of nonharassing posts to
me. Even what Nyikos might consider productive would have been
harassment. Zero should count for something in this case. Nyikos
should not be allowed to continue to do what he does. I do not follow
Nyikos around TO with a pooper scooper. Nyikos posts his harassing
posts to me.

The Frozen II thread that initiated this is a pretty good example of
Nyikosian influence on TO. In his harassing posts to me he will throw
out random negative comments about other posters and he draws them in
like flies. The negativity of Nyikos' harassment of me was a minor part
of the negativity spawned in that thread. I just said that enough was
enough because for Nyikos' last two harassment episodes he has been
generating new things to lie about forever. Whenever he is found to be
wrong about something stupid and he starts lying about it, he has to lie
about it forever. Nyikos initiates nearly all of his harassment episodes.

You should ask him if he has any examples of productive discussion that
he initiated with me that wasn't much more than the same old senseless
harassment. Nyikos fully understands what a terrible record he has, but
he keeps doing it anyway. I do not recall any instances where has tried
to harass me about something real. It has all pretty much ended with
Nyikos demonstrated to be doing something stupid and dishonest. Ask him
how many posts he has made to create that senseless record. This should
end.

Frozen Planet II thread:
https://groups.google.com/g/talk.origins/c/ovJitGN1A6w/m/nqRt9cnvAQAJ

Ron Okimoto

[Lawyer Daggett]

On Wednesday, June 7, 2023 at 7:05:45 AM UTC-4, RonO wrote:
> On 6/7/2023 4:56 AM, David Greig wrote:
> > On 2023-06-06, peter2...@gmail.com <peter2...@gmail.com> wrote:
> >> On Saturday, June 3, 2023 at 10:25:42 AM UTC-4, RonO wrote:


> > I see a few of you angryposting at each other for some reason I haven't quite
> > grasped except you all this the other(s) are lying about things.

When I read that, I immediately thought "oh no, they'll incorrectly
interpret that as an invitation to 'explain' it all again." Somewhere,
an inner-dialog said "you're thinking the worst, relax." Someone
else using the nym Casandra giggled.

> > If all of you could lower the temperature? I'm guessing the accusations have
> > been pretty much hashed out at this point and nobody's going to change their
> > views. While not taking anyone's side, it's impenetrable, nobody not already
> > engaged is going to read massive posts detailing why Poster X lied about
> > something, so maybe just let it all go?

[ interruption to emphasize last phrase ]

> > Having spent a number of years in US
> > political forums, it took me realizing that I was way overcommitted about
> > relatively small points of disagreement where I'd end up practically screaming
> > at someone for nothing. I sense this is at that level.
> >
> > I will point out to the assembled that Peter is also mildly USENET famous
> > for his posting skills since the era of the Great Renaming and abortion
> > flamewars.
> >
> > You all air out the particular subject? Great, please move on, it's disrupting
> > what little is left of the group. Pretty please, with sugar on it.
> >
> > Killfile each other already.
> >
> > --D.

> I thank you for responding to this post. Did you recieve my emails on
> this subject?

Damn it Casandra, quit laughing.

[erik simpson]

J...s Ron, read what DIG said again. KILLFILES are your friend.

[jillery]

On Wed, 7 Jun 2023 08:07:41 -0700 (PDT), erik simpson
<eastsi...@gmail.com> wrote:

>On Wednesday, June 7, 2023 at 4:05:45?AM UTC-7, RonO wrote:
>> On 6/7/2023 4:56 AM, David Greig wrote:
>> > On 2023-06-06, peter2...@gmail.com <peter2...@gmail.com> wrote:

DIG said for *both* to use killfiles. Nyikos shows he has neither the
technical nor emotional competence to use them.

[jillery]

On Wed, 7 Jun 2023 05:08:45 -0700 (PDT), Lawyer Daggett
<j.nobel...@gmail.com> wrote:

>On Wednesday, June 7, 2023 at 7:05:45?AM UTC-4, RonO wrote:
>> On 6/7/2023 4:56 AM, David Greig wrote:
>> > On 2023-06-06, peter2...@gmail.com <peter2...@gmail.com> wrote:

What's your problem with Casandra enjoying the moment as much as you
are?

[Bob Casanova]

On Wed, 7 Jun 2023 06:04:20 -0500, the following appeared in
talk.origins, posted by RonO <roki...@cox.net>:

>On 6/7/2023 4:56 AM, David Greig wrote:
>> On 2023-06-06, peter2...@gmail.com <peter2...@gmail.com> wrote:

[Balance of yet *another* rehash snipped]

Did you miss what DIG asked, even though he asked it at
least three times in different words?

"If all of you could lower the temperature?"

"... please move on..."

"Killfile each other already."
>
--

Bob C.

"The most exciting phrase to hear in science,
the one that heralds new discoveries, is not
'Eureka!' but 'That's funny...'"

- Isaac Asimov

[Mark Isaak]

My impression, from my suggestions that people cool off, is that
angryposting (a good word; I'm stealing it) is seen as a virtue, because
if a person does not angrypost, then others will not necessarily see how
bad that other person is for their angryposting.

I don't see a solution, short of banning most people here.

--
Mark Isaak
"Wisdom begins when you discover the difference between 'That
doesn't make sense' and 'I don't understand.'" - Mary Doria Russell

[*Hemidactylus*]

If two of the parties agreed to a voluntary mutual moratorium on talking to
and about each other perhaps that would help somewhat.

[peter2...@gmail.com]

On Wednesday, June 7, 2023 at 6:00:45 AM UTC-4, David Greig wrote:

Thanks for the reply, DIG.

> On 2023-06-06, peter2...@gmail.com <peter2...@gmail.com> wrote:
> > On Saturday, June 3, 2023 at 10:25:42 AM UTC-4, RonO wrote:
> >> The latest Nyikosian fiasco
> >
> > ... by yourself, it would seem: nothing has happened on the thread where you
> > posted something that you allegedly sent DIG since I replied to you on Friday (June 2),


> Confirmed, just to save you typing "allegedly" henceforth.

I saw you confirm it yesterday, and I hope you have the time to eventually
read my reply to your post there. It directly concerns Dr. Dr. Kleinman and probably JTEM,
and not me directly; even my paragraph at the end is meant to
apply to everyone as well as it does to myself.

> > and you don't even say what the fiasco YOU are alleging is all about.

> I see a few of you angryposting at each other for some reason I haven't quite
> grasped except you all this the other(s) are lying about things.

Accusations of lying [some true, most false] are only part of it.
But your present policy keeps me from going into detail on this,
since details would be very contrary to its spirit.

> If all of you could lower the temperature? I'm guessing the accusations have
> been pretty much hashed out at this point and nobody's going to change their
> views. While not taking anyone's side, it's impenetrable, nobody not already
> engaged is going to read massive posts detailing why Poster X lied about
> something, so maybe just let it all go?

DIG, do you remember a post you did within a week after I returned
to talk.origins early in December 2010 after being gone for ca. 9.5 years?

You wrote, "Now people, be nice to Peter."

In my reply, I told you that this was rather far down on my wish list,
the top item being that people would not pile on me when they
see someone making personal attacks on me.

That was probably the most naive thing I have done since my return.
It was like hanging a "Kick me" sign on my back, and two regulars whom
I had never encountered before took full advantage of it, although
one of them tried to be disarming at first.

My wish list has changed as a result of your current intervention.
At the top now is that, should you decide seriously to ban someone,
you listen carefully to everyone who has witnessed what the charges are
all about before you announce your verdict.

Far down is that you give anyone you sentence to banishment a few
day's reprieve before the sentence goes into effect, using the climax of court
scene in _A Man for All Seasons_ for inspiration. It is where Thomas More
unburdens himself of all the things about which he had remained silent the whole time
of his imprisonment.
-- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Man_for_All_Seasons_(1966_film)

I believe you will be part of an unforgettable "courtroom drama", one you
will look back upon with satisfaction, if you follow the top item.
Not sure about the item far down.

> Having spent a number of years in US
> political forums, it took me realizing that I was way overcommitted about
> relatively small points of disagreement where I'd end up practically screaming
> at someone for nothing. I sense this is at that level.
>
> I will point out to the assembled that Peter is also mildly USENET famous
> for his posting skills since the era of the Great Renaming and abortion
> flamewars.
>
> You all air out the particular subject? Great, please move on, it's disrupting
> what little is left of the group.

I respectfully disagree. Keep in mind that the over-moderated sci.bio.evolution
died of boredom about a decade ago. Moments of drama like your rare entry
into not one, but two threads, are an antidote to boredom here.

The irony here is that talk.origins was set up to be a vehicle
for rough-and-tumble between creationists and non-creationists,
which was overwhelming sci.bio.evolution before it was moderated.

Now a big part of the rough-and-tumble is between myself, the ID theorist,
and anti-ID participants of all sorts. There seems to be no way
of resurrecting sci.bio.evolution, so talk.origins is all we've got.
The history of s.b.e. could be a lesson on how to avoid too heavy a hand on moderation.

Peter Nyikos
Professor, Dept. of Mathematics -- standard disclaimer--

Univ. of South Carolina at Columbia
http://people.math.sc.edu/nyikos

[peter2...@gmail.com]

I write about two "angryposts" below, which illustrate the "because"
in contrasting ways.

> If two of the parties agreed to a voluntary mutual moratorium on talking to
> and about each other perhaps that would help somewhat.

As long as Ron O does not make personal attacks on others,
I could go along with that, but I am -- believe it or not -- very concerned
about justice in a disinterested way. I intervened this month already
in a tiff between Mark and someone with whom I have had more
"angrypost" run-ins over the years than even with Ron O. Nevertheless I was
impeccably civil in my intervention in reply to Mark's opponent, first here:

https://groups.google.com/g/talk.origins/c/xqiemRxP0mI/m/a6mKLnQCAgAJ
Re: A thread about banning, paradoxically about stopping discussion of banning
Jun 1, 2023, 9:50:39 AM UTC - 4

and then here:

https://groups.google.com/g/talk.origins/c/xqiemRxP0mI/m/q2dl_HxNAgAJ
Jun 2, 2023, 8:45:40 AM UTC - 4

They continued their tiff as though I were not there, but then I got
some results when I replied to Mark instead:

https://groups.google.com/g/talk.origins/c/xqiemRxP0mI/m/w6Lfrg1AAwAJ
Jun 5, 2023, 10:50:43 AM

Mark's opponent did an "angrypost" in reply to that, but then I did an "angrypost"
in reply that refuted its contents, and the thread has been quiet ever since.
[Knock wood! :) ]


Peter Nyikos

[RonO]

On 6/6/2023 8:29 PM, Ron Dean wrote:

You are still clueless. I did not disagree with the Top Six. They are
the best that the ID perps have ever had, and they are the same
god-of-the-gaps denial that the scientific creationists were using at
the time of the Supreme Court ruling. Do you now recall how no ID type
creationists would help you out with the Top Six? You were not
slandering them, were you? You still do not have a clue as to why the
other anti evolution creationists quit the ID scam and had to run from
the Top Six. It wasn't because of any slander or name calling. Can you
use the Top Six to support your religious beliefs? Go for it, and you
should realize what happened with respect to the Top Six. Just put your
god in the gaps and see what you get. It turned out that none of them
wanted any ID science to be successful. Just imagine if the ID perps
had ever been able to fill the gaps with a designer. It would have just
been more science to deny.

Ron Okimoto

[Ron Dean]

You are making absolutely no sense! If you never disagreed with the
Top SIx, then you must have agreed all along because this, in fact, i
s ID. So, why then do you call ID a scam. This is not rational!
Furthermore, if you never disagreed why the obsession?

The other
> creationists quit the ID scam because they could not deal with the god
> that fit into the Top Six gaps in their order of occurrence.  Why didn't
> you read the initial post in this thread?
>

Possibly, I was not on TO when this subject first come about.

>
> I thought that you had finally gotten what all the others had when you
> admitted that you did not want to understand how the Top Six fit into
> your religious beliefs and you quit arguing.
>

Either you are confusing me with someone else, or you are using a blanket
identity to cover everyone you mentioned. I never bring _my_ religion_
into any discussions on T.O..

>
> Just think of why you use the god-of-the-gaps denial.  You use them to
> support your religious beliefs.
>

Again, you're confusing me with someone else. My religious beliefs are
never mentioned.

Probably any other reason and you are just lying to yourself.
> That is how biblical creationists have been using the Top Six since they
> were part of the Gish Gallop.
>

Another of your misrepresentations. I am not a Biblical creationist.

The only reason for putting them up is to
> claim that we do not know what happened so some god did it.  What you
> need to do is put your god in all the gaps and see if you really want to
> use them.  None of the others wanted to build anything positive out of
> the gap denial.  The god that fills the Top Six gaps is not biblical
> enough for most biblical creationists.
>

As, a matter of fact, it's in the gaps where we find evolution, where
trying hopelessly to find transitional fossils to fill the gaps between
species.
Evolution has failed to find the gradual step by step intermediates
that Darwin hoped future searches would fill the gaps. Evolution in
the gaps has failed! The reason I say this is because, after 160+ years
of searching, they have about reached the to percent of the searchers curve.

>
> Read the first post in this thread.  About half way down you will come
> to what none of them could deal with.  Starting with the Big Bang that
> happened over 13 billion years ago.  The Top Six have been traditionally
> given to the rubes as independent bits of gap denial, but the ID perps
> made the mistake of putting them together and told the rubes that they
> were in "their order simply reflecting that in which they must logically
> have occurred within our universe."  Biblical creationists have
> traditionally used them as independent bits of denial that you are
> supposed to forget about one as you move onto the other.  Most of the TO
> IDiots could not do that when they were given as the best that they had
> and in their order of occurrence.
>

This means absolutely nothing to me!

>
> Some ID perps like Behe and Denton can deal with the Top Six in their
> order of occurrence.  They both realize that biological evolution is a
> fact of nature and that the universe has evolved as well.  Life has been
> changing on this planet for billions of years.  Meyer makes a big deal
> about the Cambrian explosion (#5 of the Top Six) occurring within a 25
> million year period over half a billion years ago.  He claims that 25
> million years is not enough time for something like that to happen, but
> the evidence is that it did happen before or during that period of time.
>

According, to Darwinism all life decended from a common ancestor.
The complex animals that appeared during the Cambrian csnnot
be traced back their common ancestor. Evolution is faced with
huge gap between the common ancestor and the animals
of the Cambrian explosion.

>
>  Denton has been telling the rubes, for years before the Top Six came
> out, that his designer got the ball rolling by creating the Big Bang,
> and it has all unfolded into what we have today.  You need to confront
> the Top Six and see if you can deal with them,
>

Okay, I did go to the site and I read these six, and the evidence they
presented.
I have no problem with the Top Six. I have no need to confront the Top Six.
It's obvious you cannot. If you could, by now you would have.

[Lawyer Daggett]

On Wednesday, June 7, 2023 at 10:15:45 PM UTC-4, Ron Dean wrote:
> RonO wrote:
> > On 6/6/2023 8:29 PM, Ron Dean wrote:
> >> RonO wrote:


> > You still do not get that I never disagreed with the Top Six.
> >
> You are making absolutely no sense! If you never disagreed with the
> Top SIx, then you must have agreed all along because this, in fact, i
> s ID. So, why then do you call ID a scam. This is not rational!
> Furthermore, if you never disagreed why the obsession?

RonO's point, has been a "meta" point.
It goes like this: skeptic asks
What are the best arguments that Intelligent Design has been observed?

Discovery Institute, who promotes ID gives a list. List evolves some,
ends up being this Top Six.

Ron thinks --- Aha, I've got you. Your cloak of pretending to do science
can't withstand your list.

Why is that you ask? Because, the various properties, including time-span
of action, for the suite of designers to perform the Top Six are not
compatible with the religious beliefs and agenda of the Discovery Institue.

He is not saying the Top Six are compelling or that he accepts them
scientifically. He is accepting that they are the best the DI has
to offer.

Then he says, if, just for the sake of argument, we were to grant
the validity of those six examples, the implications would be a
disaster to those attempting to push ID into the classroom.

Why you likely ask yourself. It is because accepting those specific
items as valid would pin down a set of designers, with a set of
capabilities, operating at fairly specific times. Ron believes that
doing so would force the DI into some extremely uncomfortable
choices, such as abandoning the artificial pretext of playing dumb
about what they mean by designer or admitting they really meant
the christian god all along.

Ron's belief is that he has checkmated those who want to promote
those Six examples of where they think design has occurred. I'll
regret this, but he seems rather proud of having thus won.

That context should help you to try to puzzle through the language
that otherwise seems calculated to make the reader's eyes glaze over.

I point out the above to clear up your natural confusion over what
he was trying to say. Repeating myself some, he wasn't saying that
he accepts that the top six are valid cases for ID. He is, I think, saying
that they are the best the Discovery Institute has. So he agrees that
they are their __Top__ arguments.

He also says that those arguments set a trap for the DI. And because
he is so convinced in the grandeur of the trap, he thinks that people
who argue against individual elements of the Top Six are wasting
their time and detracting from the fact that he has already checkmated
them.
.
I make no further comments on anything below so delete.

[peter2...@gmail.com]

On Wednesday, June 7, 2023 at 11:35:46 PM UTC-4, Lawyer Daggett wrote:
> On Wednesday, June 7, 2023 at 10:15:45 PM UTC-4, Ron Dean wrote:
> > RonO wrote:
> > > On 6/6/2023 8:29 PM, Ron Dean wrote:
> > >> RonO wrote:
>
>
> > > You still do not get that I never disagreed with the Top Six.
> > >
> > You are making absolutely no sense! If you never disagreed with the
> > Top SIx, then you must have agreed all along because this, in fact, i
> > s ID. So, why then do you call ID a scam. This is not rational!
> > Furthermore, if you never disagreed why the obsession?

> RonO's point, has been a "meta" point.
> It goes like this:

I have been intimately involved in sussing out Ron on his points [note the plural],
and what you write below is at best misleading.

>skeptic asks
> What are the best arguments that Intelligent Design has been observed?

"observed" is loading the dice. One does not ask whether evolution has
been observed, because everyone knows the answer: it has been observed
within varieties of the same species. All else is inference from a
gigantic mass of data that has been accumulating for well over two centuries.
The data for ID has only been written about for about a quarter of a century,
and only at length by two people: Michael Behe and Stephen Meyer.

>
> Discovery Institute, who promotes ID gives a list. List evolves some,
> ends up being this Top Six.

"List" is the wrong word here where Ron O is concerned. His "top six"
is a bunch of linked pages which are mere INTRODUCTIONS to the top six *arguments*
of the DI.

I had to go two links deep to find a place where he does this:

https://groups.google.com/g/talk.origins/c/a2K79skPGXI/m/uDwx0i-_BAAJ

These introductions are regularly being fleshed out in numerous articles of the online "magazine"
_Evolution_News_. Parts, especially #3 (OOL) have been fleshed out in different
directions by various participants, especially myself and Mark E.

> Ron thinks --- Aha, I've got you. Your cloak of pretending to do science
> can't withstand your list.

"your" is nonsense. Only Ron O has put up the whole list, except for me
once or twice, and I am not a person at whom the list is aimed.

> Why is that you ask? Because, the various properties, including time-span
> of action, for the suite of designers to perform the Top Six are not
> compatible with the religious beliefs and agenda of the Discovery Institue.

Only a minority of the DI people, I believe. Besides, this is just a preamble
to Ron O's real use of the list in talk.origins, which is to make wild stabs
in the dark about the beliefs of Glenn, Kalkidas, Mark E, and now Ron Dean,
and to post his GIGO about the whole list being incompatible with their beliefs.

>
> He is not saying the Top Six are compelling or that he accepts them
> scientifically.

In fact, he rejects them. Take a look at the following excerpt from the OP of this very thread:

"the god-of-the-gaps denial junk that makes up the Top Six have been standard
creationist stupidity for around half a century."

In contrast to that half century, the many fleshings-out have mostly been made in the 21st century.
Moreover, the modern theory of ID started with _Darwin's_Black_Box_, a mere 27 years ago,
and the DI only started in earnest on fine tuning (#2) and the Big Bang (#1) shortly before the list of
introductions was composed in 2017. Ron O's whole imaginary "bait and switch scam" only
refers to biological evolution on earth, covered only by the last 3 items on the list.

> He is accepting that they are the best the DI has
> to offer.

This use of "accepting" is a blatant equivocation. See what I've quoted just now,
and further above about what Ron O refers to as the Top Six.

In fact, to show how little fleshing out takes place *there*: #2 reads like a synopsis of the introduction
to Martin Rees's magnificent book, _Just_Six_Numbers_, except that Luskin does
not mention anything about Rees or his book. Luskin is a mere popularizer, and a sloppy one at that.

> Then he says, if, just for the sake of argument, we were to grant
> the validity of those six examples, the implications would be a
> disaster to those attempting to push ID into the classroom.

Only if they were YECs or Biblical literalists. Neither of whom has been
seen in talk.origins for the whole time since my return in December 2010,
unless you count Ray Martinez. Do you?

In summary, Ron O has been knocking down a straw man all this time.

> Why you likely ask yourself. It is because accepting those specific
> items as valid would pin down a set of designers, with a set of
> capabilities, operating at fairly specific times.

"valid" means from a completely naturalistic, materialistic point of view.
And even there I have a loophole, which you have seen and responded to:

https://groups.google.com/g/talk.origins/c/QflrDHqlDD0/m/1p6NjO4TAgAJ
Designer of Our Universe by the Back Door?
Apr 12, 2023, 10:35:19 PM

This "back door designer" is the Theistic "godlike being" that I wrote about here:

https://groups.google.com/g/talk.origins/c/eBpGygILdmc/m/0rnMnVZbAwAJ
Re: Correcting Misconceptions About My ID Theory
Jun 5, 2023, 7:10:44 PM

I'd love to have you join this thread, too, and continue this discussion there.


I have no further comments on what you wrote below, but I am leaving it in.

Peter Nyikos
Professor, Dept. of Mathematics -- standard disclaimer--
Univ. of South Carolina at Columbia
http://people.math.sc.edu/nyikos

[Lawyer Daggett]

On Thursday, June 8, 2023 at 11:00:46 AM UTC-4, peter2...@gmail.com wrote:
> On Wednesday, June 7, 2023 at 11:35:46 PM UTC-4, Lawyer Daggett wrote:
> > On Wednesday, June 7, 2023 at 10:15:45 PM UTC-4, Ron Dean wrote:
> > > RonO wrote:
> > > > On 6/6/2023 8:29 PM, Ron Dean wrote:
> > > >> RonO wrote:
> >
> >
> > > > You still do not get that I never disagreed with the Top Six.
> > > >
> > > You are making absolutely no sense! If you never disagreed with the
> > > Top SIx, then you must have agreed all along because this, in fact, i
> > > s ID. So, why then do you call ID a scam. This is not rational!
> > > Furthermore, if you never disagreed why the obsession?
>
> > RonO's point, has been a "meta" point.
> > It goes like this:

> I have been intimately involved in sussing out Ron on his points [note the plural],
> and what you write below is at best misleading.

First point: Only RonO can legitimately claim that a synopsis of his
point is misleading. I was not advocating for or against the points
I made in attempting to explain his argument to Ron Dean.

Second point: If you address the context, I was responding to Ron Dean
expressing confusion over why RonO was complaining so much about
the Top Six if he agrees with them. Read for context, I was addressing that.
Your reply doesn't help. Your reply will, I expect, further confuse
RD on that point.

Third point: your quibbles below further obfuscate thing while
shedding little light. Oblique references to things written elsewhere
are usually useless. Using such to drum up business in your
other threads or get people to read your other posts feels like the
guy handing out flyers in Time Square recruiting patrons to a
strip club. It's a turn off.

Fourth point: I will not be your surrogate to argue with about whatever
you think RonO is arguing, though I applaud any decision you might
make to not engage with him (and vis versa).

Beyond that, I shall not quibble with you on minor points below.
Quibbling about what you think about what I think is a summary
of what another's argument is --- is far too derivative, especially
when I am not attempting to champion said argument.

[peter2...@gmail.com]

On Thursday, June 8, 2023 at 11:45:47 AM UTC-4, Lawyer Daggett wrote:
> On Thursday, June 8, 2023 at 11:00:46 AM UTC-4, peter2...@gmail.com wrote:
> > On Wednesday, June 7, 2023 at 11:35:46 PM UTC-4, Lawyer Daggett wrote:
> > > On Wednesday, June 7, 2023 at 10:15:45 PM UTC-4, Ron Dean wrote:
> > > > RonO wrote:
> > > > > On 6/6/2023 8:29 PM, Ron Dean wrote:
> > > > >> RonO wrote:
> > >
> > >
> > > > > You still do not get that I never disagreed with the Top Six.

> > > > You are making absolutely no sense! If you never disagreed with the
> > > > Top SIx, then you must have agreed all along because this, in fact, i
> > > > s ID. So, why then do you call ID a scam. This is not rational!
> > > > Furthermore, if you never disagreed why the obsession?
> >
> > > RonO's point, has been a "meta" point.
> > > It goes like this:
>
> > I have been intimately involved in sussing out Ron on his points [note the plural],
> > and what you write below is at best misleading.

> First point: Only RonO can legitimately claim that a synopsis of his
> point is misleading.

Nonsense. This isn't talk.origins.mindreading. We go on what we see in the posts of others.

Ron O is a master of equivocation. He uses "The Top Six" to mean what he thinks
will help him win one argument, then another way if he can win another argument.
But the bulk of the usages refers specifically to six webpages that INTRODUCE
six many-faceted arguments, and treats those pages as "The best the IDiots have to offer."

I have the advantage over you because I can, and have quoted comments
that undermine your "synopsis". Here is an example from the post to which I am replying:

[moved from far down]
[Daggett:]

> > > He is not saying the Top Six are compelling or that he accepts them
> > > scientifically.

[Nyikos:]

> > In fact, he rejects them. Take a look at the following excerpt from the OP of this very thread:

> > "the god-of-the-gaps denial junk that makes up the Top Six have been standard
> > creationist stupidity for around half a century."

> > In contrast to that half century, the many fleshings-out have mostly been made in the 21st century.
> > Moreover, the modern theory of ID started with _Darwin's_Black_Box_, a mere 27 years ago

[end of example]

You, on the other hand, indulge in shyster lawyer tactics below to make a *vice* out of quoting
support for any and all interpretations of what Ron O has written.

> I was not advocating for or against the points
> I made in attempting to explain his argument to Ron Dean.

You are belaboring the obvious. IOW, "Well, du-uh!"

But you are ALSO not advocating for or against your *explanation* of his argument!
A more shysterish obfuscation can hardly be imagined.

>
> Second point: If you address the context, I was responding to Ron Dean
> expressing confusion over why RonO was complaining so much about
> the Top Six if he agrees with them.

And you proceeded to post a bunch of half-baked comments
that would confuse Ron Dean far more. That is the context of
which you write as if it excused your misleading "synopsis".
It does the opposite.

> Read for context, I was addressing that.
> Your reply doesn't help. Your reply will, I expect, further confuse
> RD on that point.

Wishful thinking of this sort is a common habit of yours.

> Third point: your quibbles below further obfuscate thing while
> shedding little light.

"obfuscating" is what YOU are doing below. Stop trying to project your
behavior onto me.

Moreover, "quibble[s]" is a talisman that Erik Simpson has recently used to ward
off legitimate criticism, and you are following in his footsteps
by stretching it way past its usual definition.

It makes a molehill out of a mountain, with no attempt at justification
-- mainly because any such attempt would fail.

> Oblique references to things written elsewhere
> are usually useless.

It is you who made oblique references to alleged writings
by Ron O that you made no attempt to identify.
They are so many and so transparent that I had to
postpone the demonstration to a later post to keep
this one from getting much longer than it already is.

> Using such to drum up business in your
> other threads or get people to read your other posts feels like the
> guy handing out flyers in Time Square recruiting patrons to a
> strip club. It's a turn off.

This insult is a rank piece of polemical opportunism.
I expect you to show how opportunistic it is by
turning a blind eye to the fact that you are projecting
Ron O's behavior onto me.

Ron O does this sort of thing all the time. He puts in links
to earlier posts and pretends that they support his arguments.
But when you click on those links, they use other links to
support the closest argument you can find to the argument
Ron O is allegedly supporting; and the process continues, until
you have a praire dog maze of tunnels that get further and further away from the argument.

>
> Fourth point: I will not be your surrogate

Bizarre use of "your surrogate" noted.

>to argue with about whatever
> you think RonO is arguing, though I applaud any decision you might
> make to not engage with him (and vis versa).

> Beyond that, I shall not quibble with you on minor points below.

Making a molehill out of a mountain again, "supporting" the
word "quibble" with the word "minor."

> Quibbling about what you think about what I think is a summary
> of what another's argument is --- is far too derivative, especially
> when I am not attempting to champion said argument.

Nor, FAR more importantly, are you attempting to champion your "summary"
of what you *allegedly* think Ron O's argumnt is.

In fact, in my reply to your "summary", I called one bluff of yours after another,
and you are folding on all the hands involved.


<snip one called bluff of yours after another, with the chips to be collected in
a separate post, perhaps today if time permits>


The following was the first non-bluff of yours after the torrent which I
have snipped, and for once I think you DO have a valid description
of what Ron O thinks:

> > > Why you likely ask yourself. It is because accepting those specific
> > > items as valid would pin down a set of designers, with a set of
> > > capabilities, operating at fairly specific times.

> > "valid" means from a completely naturalistic, materialistic point of view.

And I believe Ron O has exactly that kind of world view, without
any belief in a multiverse. So the loophole of which I write below
is probably under his radar screen.

> > And even there I have a loophole, which you have seen and responded to:
> >
> > https://groups.google.com/g/talk.origins/c/QflrDHqlDD0/m/1p6NjO4TAgAJ
> > Designer of Our Universe by the Back Door?
> > Apr 12, 2023, 10:35:19 PM
> >
> > This "back door designer" is the Theistic "godlike being" that I wrote about here:

> > https://groups.google.com/g/talk.origins/c/eBpGygILdmc/m/0rnMnVZbAwAJ
> > Re: Correcting Misconceptions About My ID Theory
> > Jun 5, 2023, 7:10:44 PM

> > I'd love to have you join this thread, too, and continue this discussion there.

Your lack of a response to this suggests that you would like to treat that thread as a spectator sport
between Harshman and myself. Unfortunately, I doubt that he has a deep enough
understanding of biochemistry and molecular biology to be able
to comment intelligently on a post I'll be doing today on the testability
of various OOL-on-earth hypotheses.

But you are one of the few here who I think DO have that understanding,
and it would be a shame if you did not participate.

Peter Nyikos
Professor, Dept. of Mathematics -- standard disclaimer--

Univ. of South Carolina in Columbia
http://people.math.sc.edu/nyikos