Discovery Institute: Full Frontal Stupidity

MANY SCIENTIFIC ORGANIZATIONS have issued statements about creationism, including the Intelligent Design (ID) version of creationism. Such statements are needed to counter the endless assaults on science being launched by the tireless foes of reason. Every time the forces of ignorance launch a new campaign, those who are the principal defenders of reason are obliged to waste their time and speak out yet again, lest we face an ignorance-fed civilizational collapse like that in Asimov’s Nightfall.

Most recently, the august American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) issued a statement about Ben Stein’s Expelled: Regarding the Importance of the Integrity of Science as Depicted in Film. And back in 2002, the AAAS published a vigorous Resolution on Intelligent Design Theory.

Casey Luskin, that amazingly prolific and scientifically clueless Discoveroid, takes such efforts as “proof” of the intolerance of the “Darwinists.” The more people speak out against creationism, and the more learned and prestigious the statements, the more Casey is convinced that there’s a conspiracy against him. This is quite ironic, considering that the Discoveroids are lately screeching about freedom of speech while promoting their so-called Academic Freedom Act.

Casey’s latest rant about the “Darwinist” conspiracy is in a blog published by the Discovery Institute’s Center for Science and Culture. Here is the Discoveroid’s article: AAAS Goes from Science Organization to Movie Critic and Promoter of Religion. Excerpts (with Curmudgeonly commentary):

This week the AAAS issued a press release officially condemning the documentary Expelled as an instance of “profound dishonesty” because it “badly misrepresents the scientific community as intolerant of dissent.”

Hey Casey! The truth hurts, doesn’t it? Besides, you’re paid to issue anti-science statements all the time, and you’re certainly free to do so. Fair is fair. Continuing with Casey’s rant:

Ironically, the AAAS’s own behavior seems to demonstrate that the scientific community can be “intolerant of dissent” — at least when it comes to Darwinism: in 2002, the AAAS issued a press release condemning intelligent design (ID), providing proof-positive of the intolerance of the scientific community towards dissent from Darwinism.

Hey Casey! You Discoveroids have full-time careers flooding the blogosphere with trash, nonsense, and outright lies. But if an honest — and honorable — organization of genuine scientists speaks out against your propaganda, that gets labeled “proof-positive of the intolerance of the scientific community.” Right.

When top-science organizations issue press releases against an idea, with the obvious intent of making that idea taboo in the scientific community, then you know that they are being driven by politics, not science. [Bold font in the original.]

Yes, Casey. We can’t have organizations running around issuing “press releases against an idea, with the obvious intent of making that idea taboo” can we? Hey, wait a minute! Isn’t there a movie out there that tries to link the theory of evolution with Hitler? I wonder what you Discoveroids think of that. Oh, wait — your blog is full of praise for that one.

Casey, Casey … You truly are hopeless. Let me try to spell it out for you: Every legitimate science organization that has addressed the issue has spoken out against creationism-ID. Every one! And they do this only because you have been successful in motivating some of the most ignorant and gullible fools in society to swallow your propaganda, which endangers the essential enterprise of science education. Yet when the targets of your propaganda issue statements in self-defense, you squawk that scientists “are being driven by politics, not science.”

Hey, Casey! Do all those anti-creationism statements really bother you? Okay then, I’ll give you a whole list of them to blow away your two biggest falsehoods: (1) that there is a scientific controversy about evolution; and (2) that evolution is atheism. Here you go, Casey:

Eugenie Scott’s National Center for Science Education has a long list of scientific organizations which have issued statements favoring evolution and critical of creationism — including its inbred and malformed offspring, Intelligent Design: Statements from Scientific and Scholarly Organizations.

Project Steve, listing over 800 “Steves,” [Addendum: over 1,100 as of December 2010] about two-thirds of whom are biologists, who strongly support evolution. The Steves are only the tip of the scientific iceberg, because the name Steve (or Stephanie, Esteban, or Stefano, etc.) is given to only about 1% of the population. Therefore, the 800 Steves probably represent 80,000 scientists [over 110,000 as of December 2010]. See also Project Steve update.

The Clergy Letter Project, a strong, pro-evolution statement signed by over 11,000 Christian clergymen; Statements from Religious Organizations, a list of Christian and Jewish denominations, including Roman Catholics, that accept (or at least don’t dispute) evolution; and the recent statement opposing creationism by the Archbishop of Canterbury, leader of the 70-million-member Anglican Communion.

And finally, Casey, for a list of all creationist misstatements, with refutations, go here: An Index to Creationist Claims.

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3 responses to “Discovery Institute: Full Frontal Stupidity

  1. Since Luskin and the other Disco idiots are causing more damage to this country than the Muslim terrorists, shouldn’t our government be hunting them down and sending them to the Guantanamo Bay detention camp?

  2. Pingback: Project Steve: Total Reaches 900 « The Sensuous Curmudgeon