March 28, 2004

Greater and greater numbers of scientists are joining the ID movement, which is why we keep referring to the same three year after year.

ID is a scientific theory for detecting purpose and teleology in nature. But don't ask us what that purpose is, because that's a religious question that's separate from ID. The Designer could be anything from God to a space alien. But the Raelians, who believe it was a space alien, are being illogical.

posted by Wolof 20 years ago
  • thanks, wolof - that gave me a laugh! we hates the ID proponents! hates them forever! /gollum
  • An ID wankfest.
  • homunculus you come up with the most appropriate links! good grappling!
  • You know, maybe Georgia's water supply should be tested. Something has seriously gone wrong in that state.
  • In defence of the people of Georgia there was a disclaimer on the second homunculus link - This is a parody and satire site: it's fake. This site contains no real facts or information. If you think you found a fact, you are mistaken. Never believe anything you read in onlinenewspapers.
  • Never believe anything you read in onlinenewspapers. Or offline (cf. Glass, Blair et al).
  • No thread on this topic would be complete without mentioning Unintelligent Design.
  • I tried to give this a fair read until I reached: # Absolutely everything wrong in society is caused by dogmatic Darwinian atheistic materialists. Including stereotyping, demonizing, and scapegoating. [10] # Darwinists are responsible for both socialism and laissez-faire capitalism. Both racism and liberalism. Both feminism and sexism. Both animal research and the animal rights movement. And Commie-Nazism. [11] Wow! I guess if they can make 100 scientists at Bob Jones University-- then they have a real coup.
  • gspm, if that was the only freakass thing going on in Georgia, I wouldn't have said squat. But, given the news coming out of Georgia these days, I stand by my statement.
  • The stories are real. Only the names, facts and events have been changed.
  • Darwinists are responsible for both socialism and laissez-faire capitalism. Both racism and liberalism. Both feminism and sexism. Both animal research and the animal rights movement. And Commie-Nazism. Whoa! So, without darwinists, live would be quite pretty boring.
  • Darwinists are responsible for ... Commie-Nazism. Send McBain after them!
  • Until the Intelligent Design folks can explain to me why men have nipples, I'm sticking with Darwin.
  • Stupid question, probably, but what is it with those fake dicks female hyenas have?
  • well, glad you asked, wolof. my advisor and one of my committee members have been part of the longest-running continuous study of the spotted hyena in kenya, 20+ years of research on the same social group. the pseudopenises are used for greeting - walk up to a fellow hyena, lift leg, show off your erection, sniff each other, then back away. (partly the idea of the greeting is that exposing your genitals so close to the strongest teeth in the mammal kingdom is a sure sign that you're willing to trust each other.) the pseudopenis is a greatly enlarged clitoris. they have sex and give birth through this structure (imagine passing a bowling ball out through your urethra). this is painful, dangerous, and often results in the loss of the first litter or two (due to suffocation during the passage out) or the death of the mother. the upshot is that, due to the amazingly high levels of androgens the mothers have, they are very aggressive and completely dominant. the highest ranked breeding male is always ranked lower than the lowest ranked female in the clan. the social structure is incredibly rigid and does not change (except due to leaving the clan or death). read more here (with cute photos of the hynea rugrats in the gallery). i myself also study an aggressive, ferocious african mammal from the kenya study site, but i chose the one that can't bite your leg off if it gets mad. and this just makes me mad: that "panda's thumb" book was published by my own university. from the amazon.com review: "The publisher, Michigan State University, in accordance with academic policies for its Rhetoric and Public Affairs Series, submitted the book to an expert panel of reviewers including a professor of biochemistry at an Ivy-league school and professors in the philosophy of science and rhetoric of human inquiry fields. This will go a long ways in silencing critics of intelligent-design who constantly, and falsely, claim that the theory is not supported by peer-reviewed literature. There is no doubt that this volume has been peer-reviewed." right. peer-reviewed. but (as with any of this crap science stuff) NOT peer-reviewed by anybody qualified to know what the hell they're talking about! i mean, philosophy of science professors? and WTF is "rhetoric of human inquiry"??? seriously - that's a friggin degree? how about sending it to someone who actually studies evolutionary biology? gee, i wonder where they could find such a person at MSU? jeez. we had a big shitfit in the dept. a while ago when we discovered that one of the instructors in the biology for non-majors program was teaching ID in the classroom... that did not go over well. wonder how well this will go over; i know the right people to send it to...
  • I'm confused - the only Panda's Thumb I could find is Stephen Jay Gould's book. I haven't read it, but I have never heard of Gould associated with theories of intelligent design. The website Panda's Thumb (by someone else) is also explaining evolution, to combat intelligent design. Is there another book of the same name?
  • my bad - the book i was referring to was "Darwinism, Design, and Public Education", listed as a book review on the panda's thumb website. sorry for the confusion...
  • Does no one ever make the argument that schools are not supposed to teach all knowledge, but just a specific set? Schools are for imparting certain secular skills and theories, of which evolution is just one. There are many things not taught in schools in North America, including heritage languages and religion of any kind (unless you are in a religious run school, of course). If you want your children to learn about intelligent design as well, then it is up to you to send them to a supplementary class at church or Sunday school. (Just like if I want my child to learn how to make the Vulcan hand salute, I have to take the resposibility on myself, even if it is an essential nerd skill.) One could make the argument that children are required by law to attend these secularist biology classes, but I believe this fails on two points. One, you do always have the option to home-school or send your child to a private religious school (not that I think either are very good ideas - makes for bad socialization). But the big proof against the power public school biology teachers to "indoctrinate" students with godless evolution is the sheer apathy of students - like they think we remember anything we learned at school. As if.
  • I actually had to learn evolution from my brother when I was a kid. My biology teachers did the ID dance combined with Lamarckianism.
  • Hey, thanks for the hyena info, frogs! Top stuff!
  • *Raises trembling finger* I just have to ask - the pseudopenis thing? How do they have sex with it? Isn't that like trying to bang two tubes together? I will perfectly understand if you don't answer the question, frogs. *runs away*
  • During mating it retracts much like a shirt sleeve being pushed up, and during birth it stretches so much that it looks like a water balloon. From Sex and the Spotted Hyena. /was curious, too
  • Thanks, goetter. Sounds gruesome. Thought giving birth as a human was bad enough; sure wouldn't care to be a first-time hyaena mother.
  • goetter - oddly enough a lot of the data presented on the talek clan in the article you linked to wasn't collected by frank et. al. (as far as i know) but by my committee member & advisor, even though they aren't credited for it in the text. discovery channel did a piece on them a while ago, i know my advisor has a copy of the tape but i've yet to see it. they also tend to disagree with frank's group regarding some of the comclusions he has made on captive studies in berkeley. captive studies, while useful, aren't under the same conditions you see in the wild. and from what i understand, the only way to tell male and female apart is by the shape of the penis/pseudopenis tip - pointy in males, blunt in females. and sex is rather tricky - it absolutely cannot happen unless the female is willing. if she doesn't cooperate, it would be physically impossible for the male to force her. which probably helps keep the females in charge in hyena society.
  • How is this even still a debate? *beats head on table*
  • Ah, mct, you know how, and why. Sadly, even though the folks who take the Bible as the best evidence for the explanation for everything are truly in the minority in this country, they've managed to get into the limelight. The rest of us are so used to taking the scientific explanation for granted that we've forgotten how to counter their arguments effectively. So, all of us talk to those that agree with us, and nobody's mind gets changed. How do we start up a dialogue in this country again?
  • somebody thinks there's still a debate.
  • I found out what the religous right are really advocating.
  • The debate over teaching ID in schools goes on in Pennsylvania. In the meantime, the Roman Catholic church seems hint they go with the theory of evolution. (And, just maybe, don't think the fundamentalis Christian reliance of Revolutions description of the end times is metaphore, at best.)
  • Courtesy of the blue, they're doing more than hinting now, and they've even specifically called fundies out. That's right. The entrenched, very vocal religious minority in my country (the one that's pretty well running things right now, yes, that one), has been effectively called archaic and superstitious in its worldview by THE ROMAN CATHOLIC CHURCH. If I were still a Southern Baptist, I imagine I'd be chucking the whole thing right now and studying the Tao Te Ching.
  • MCT, that's exactly the same article that path linked. Silly boy. In repayment, I demand to see a copy of the movie you made! ;)
  • Oh Snap!
  • I AM A MORON. I didn't check it because I missed it before, and assumed it was an old comment. I've been told that my city will have all the movies from the competition online soon. I have no idea when, exactly. If they don't do it soon, then I'll set up a torrent or figure something out.
  • And here I thought that you'd turned those evil superpowers demonstrated in your movie to good and, divining through them that it's my birthday in a week, were generously giving me the excuse I've been looking for to demand to see the movie. Silly me. As for the movie... do you have a DVD burner? A CD burner? I'd be happy to send you either a DVD or CD, should all else fail. I've got extra CDs around from the spindles I bought in order to schlep my school projects back and forth between class and home.