Rant O’ the Day

Kung Fu Monkey explains why George Bush’s endorsement of Intelligent Design is a crock, and why it matters. A lot.

Includes the best characterisation of ID ever:

Intelligent Design, or as it’s more commonly known: “Creationism Trying to Look Serious By, Say, Squinting — Like Denise Richards Playing the Nuclear Weapons Expert In That Bond Movie“.

I’m jealous. I wish I had that kind of flamage-fu.

Splitting the Conservative Creationist Wedge

This Free Republic article is just a repost of George Bush’s recent endorsement of ID. (Thanks to Fred at Pharyngula for the pointer.)

The interesting part is in the comments. It’s interesting to see two factions of Freepers emerge: those who support teaching creationism, and those who think, “It’s really hard to support the president when he starts pushing obscurantist nonsense.” It’ll be interesting to see whether creationism or anti-evolutionism becomes a wedge issue splitting the Republican party.

Bush Endorses ID

According to several sources, including this Seattle Times article, president Bush has endorsed Intelligent Design Creationism:

WASHINGTON — President Bush waded into the debate over evolution and “intelligent design” yesterday, saying schools should teach both on the origins and complexity of life.

In a wide-ranging question-and-answer session with a small group of reporters, Bush essentially endorsed efforts by Christian conservatives to give intelligent design equal standing with evolution in the nation’s schools.

Google vs. Creationism

One of the claims made by young-earth creationists (YECs) is that the Grand Canyon was formed when the waters of Noah’s flood subsided; a whole lot of water drained off and carved a channel in the rock.

Geologists have known for a long time that this idea is ridiculous. For regular folks like me, though, Google Maps can help illustrate why it’s nonsense.

The ID Job Market Sucks

In his latest entry at Uncommon Descent, Dembski laments the state of the job market for ID supporters, as well as the fact that people who criticize ID can get promoted:

It’s gratifying to see that ID is helping people make careers and bring home the bacon. Robert Pennock is happily ensconced at Michigan State University for criticizing ID. Barbara Forrest was promoted to full professor at South Eastern Louisiana State University for her work debunking ID. And most recently Niall Shanks moved from East Tennessee State University to an endowed chair at Wichita State University so that he can provide a counterblast to ID in Kansas (go here for the announcement of Shanks’s appointment — I understand that this appointment involved a hefty pay increase). Meanwhile, ID supporters are not just having a hard time getting academic jobs but even getting their PhDs (e.g., the case of Bryan Leonard).

From the article, and from the comments that haven’t been deleted, we learn that this is because the scientific establishment feels threatened by ID; the good old boy network rewards those who criticize ID.

It has nothing — nothing! — to do with the fact that ID isn’t a theory or even a coherent hypothesis, makes no testable predictions, is based on misinformation, obfuscation, and the notion that “somewhere, somehow, there’s something wrong with evolution”, or that ID proponents aren’t submitting ID-related papers to peer-reviewed journals.

That obviously couldn’t be it. Obviously it’s that they’re being persecuted.

Jefferson, Madison, Bush, and Separation of Church and State

I just listened to a particularly interesting show about Jefferson, Madison, and their attitudes on the separation of church and state. Go listen to it.

ID Falling Apart?

William Dembski has an article on his weblog about what to do if the courts rule against intelligent design.

But first, allow me to laugh out loud at this part:

Don’t be distracted by the “thousands” of articles being published in the research journals that purport to support evolutionary theory — this is an artifact of overfunding an underachieving theory.

He then continues:

I therefore offer the following proposal if ID gets outlawed from our public schools: retitle it Intelligent Evolution (IE).