WE present to you, dear reader, a letter-to-the-editor titled Buhl Cummings: Are cows and trees related?, which appears in the Athens Banner-Herald of Athens, Georgia. That’s a college town, home to the University of Georgia.

Athens is also home to Athens Christian School, and as their About Us page informs us, the school was “was founded in 1970 by Drs. Buhl and Lois Cummings …” We also learned from this news article that Buhl was succeeded as headmaster earlier this year by his son, Steve Cummings.

Today’s letter-to-the-editor is signed by Buhl Cummings, presumably the same man who founded Athens Christian and served so long as its headmaster. Therefore, because of the author’s local prominence, we’ll forgo our custom of omitting the letter-writer’s name and city.

We’ll copy today’s letter in its entirety, adding some bold font for emphasis, and of course our Curmudgeonly commentary between the paragraphs. Here we go:

The Banner-Herald’s Tuesday editorial page featured a commentary from a University of Georgia professor of cellular biology who proffered the following idea: “In the past 500 years there have been many great ideas that have affected human society, yet two stand alone.”

Buhl is probably referring to this letter from 24 November: ‘Origin’ should bring wonder, not fear. It’s a good letter, written by Mark Farmer, described as “a professor of cellular biology at the University of Georgia and a spokesman for Georgia Citizens for Integrity in Science Education.” We assume he’s a frontline warrior in local creationism controversies, and we’re guessing that he and Buhl have had their disagreements in the past. We’ll quote one brief portion of professor Farmer’s letter:

Through our genes we are connected to every living thing. Through our chemistry we are connected to the Earth. Through our very atoms we are connected to the stars and the universe.

Okay, but what were those two great ideas in the past 500 years that Farmer wrote about and which Buhl started out by mentioning? Let’s read on from today’s letter:

The professor then goes on to note two books: “On the Revolutions of the Celestial Spheres” by Nicolaus Copernicus, who first offered the idea that the Earth circles the sun, and Charles Darwin’s “On the Origin of Species,” which sets forth the theory of biological evolution. In its simplest form, the theory states that all life on Earth is connected by common ancestry.

Whoa! Buhl can’t let that go unchallenged. His letter continues:

Now, my dear professor, you completely overlooked the book that predates both of these books by hundreds of years and has shaped the lives of millions of people across the world. That book is the Bible. The Bible teaches that God is the Creator.

Uh, we thought the professor had specifically mentioned the past 500 years. Oh well. Here’s more from Buhl:

Regardless of Darwin’s views, it’s hard for me to believe that the cow chewing her cud and the tree under which she stands are connected, except that the cow appreciates the shade of the tree.

Smack! Socko! Wham, Bamm! How do ya like that one, professor?

And this is the letter’s end:

Try the Bible on for size. You might like the fit.

Ah ha! Brilliant put-down! And now, dear reader, we leave the happy town of Athens, Georgia. Bless ‘em all.

Copyright © 2009. The Sensuous Curmudgeon. All rights reserved.

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It burns…. have you noticed that the friends of the master of the universe are always insane and mega stupid…
Bypass your intellect folks, then gawd will become obvious

Are you crazy enough to make it to the imaginary hevn, to the imaginary mass murderer in the sky… or will you go to imaginary hell, to the imaginary mass murderers right hand devil, Satan.
Check it

Yes I know you are asking yourself if hell is that bad.. consider being in hevn with Ray and Kirk for frigging ever… that’s hell right there.

Atheist philosopher Thomas Nagel praised Signature in the Cell in the Times Literary Supplement, stating,

Stephen C. Meyer’s Signature in the Cell: DNA and the evidence for Intelligent Design (HarperCollins) is a detailed account of the problem of how life came into existence from lifeless matter – something that had to happen before the process of biological evolution could begin. The controversy over Intelligent Design has so far focused mainly on whether the evolution of life since its beginnings can be explained entirely by natural selection and other non-purposive causes. Meyer takes up the prior question of how the immensely complex and exquisitely functional chemical structure of DNA, which cannot be explained by natural selection because it makes natural selection possible, could have originated without an intentional cause. He examines the history and present state of research on non-purposive chemical explanations of the origin of life, and argues that the available evidence offers no prospect of a credible naturalistic alternative to the hypothesis of an intentional cause. Meyer is a Christian, but atheists, and theists who believe God never intervenes in the natural world, will be instructed by his careful presentation of this fiendishly difficult problem.

(HT: Uncommon Descent)

I love Bryan Appleyard’s eloquent retorts to the blistering rhetoric coming out of New Atheistland. Here’s Appleyard today on PZ Myers’s scientism:

[M]ention intelligent design and the likes of Myers will be hurling abuse. But I gather from reading John Gribbin’s superb exposition In Search of the Multiverse that ID is, in fact, a perfectly respectable hypothesis among some physicists – the designer would not be a deity but a more technically advanced civilisation. So the world is ‘designed’ then? ‘No!‘ howls Myers; ‘Maybe,’ murmur the physicists. But there’s a bigger reason than that. Treating science as an ideology, an occasion for polemic and abuse, and anathematising those who dissent is profoundly unscientific. It is an attitude that will, in the end, damage not just science itself but science as a public institution. Science is, as Thomas Nagel put it, a ‘view from nowhere‘, it is a method, not a posture towards the world. It assumes – and, indeed, attains – the possibility of a superhuman perspective. As such, it is a profoundly admirable and magnificent achievement of the human intellect. But it is only one such achievement. When science aspires to be anything else – ideology, for example – it is prone to delusion, fantasy and intolerance. That is where we now are, a dangerous place where people set up web sites that abandon mere explanation and promote science as an ideology, as, in effect, an opinion held with such ferocity that all dissent must be crushed. This phase, I hope, will pass. But I am beginning to have my doubts.

THE email imbroglio known as ClimateGate appears to have literally unhinged the neo-theocrats at the Discovery Institute’s Center for Science and Culture (a/k/a the Discoveroids). At their blog they now have this article posted: Wesley Smith on “The New Inquisition: Ideology’s Corruption of Science”. It’s by John West.

Who is John West? Most of you already know, so you can skip this indented paragraph:

West is a winner of the Curmudgeon’s Buffoon Award. He’s a Senior Fellow at the Seattle-based Discovery Institute (the DI), where he is Associate Director of their Center for Science and Culture. That makes him one of the chief Keepers of their Wedge strategy, and the guru of the cdesign proponentsists (a term described here: cdesign proponentsists).

West’s new article isn’t much, but it’s the latest episode in the Discoveroids’ recent embrace of ClimateGate as the long-awaited vindication of their creationism. Somehow, because of the squabble over global warming, the Discoveroids imagine that “big science” will collapse and their jihad against “Darwinism” will achieve respectability. Fat chance. They’ll have better luck if they go out and search for the remains of Noah’s Ark.

West’s article is quite short. In fact, it’s little more than a link to and a brief excerpt from the blog of another creationist named Wesley J. Smith. A moment’s Googling around informs us that Smith is a “senior fellow” at the Discovery Institute, so we have here is one Discoveroid quoting another. Whoop-de-doo!

West is, we assume, attempting to give the impression that someone else, at some other blog, agrees with the Discoveroids about the meaning of ClimateGate. Yes, folks, it’s a real groundswell!

Anyway, although the substance of West’s post isn’t at all newsworthy, it does reveal the thinking in Seattle. You don’t want to call it “thinking”? Well, whatever it is the Discoveroids do, here’s West’s latest, with bold font added by us:

Wesley J. Smith has an excellent post at his First Things blog on how the recent ClimateGate scandal is just a symptom of a much broader problem involving the ideological corruption of science:

That’s all West says. The rest of his post is a one-paragraph excerpt from Smith’s blog. We’ll break that into smaller parts so we can toss in a bit of Curmudgeonly commentary. Here’s what West copied from Smith:

Global warming isn’t the only field in which we have witnessed this kind of brazen ideological corruption of science in recent years. I have seen the same approach taken repeatedly against heterodox views in the human cloning/ESCR controversy, to the point that people have been driven off of faculties or denied tenure.

More “expelled” material? We’re not interested in that. Let’s read on:

My colleagues at the Discovery Institute face a similar buzz saw in their pursuit of intelligent design hypothesis, and then are taunted by the censors for not being published in peer reviewed journals.

Get that? His “colleagues at the Discovery Institute,” which we translate as his “fellow creationists” are “taunted by the censors for not being published in peer reviewed journals.” Censors? He means scientists, the ones who review manuscripts to see if they meet their journal’s standards. They know creationist trash when they see it.

We continue with Smith’s paragraph:

Indeed, when Richard Sternberg published an ID article, he was attacked and slandered so mercilessly by the Darwinists, that it sent a clear and threatening message to all other journal editors that they publish ID-oriented papers at peril to their own careers.

He refers to what we’ve mentioned before, the peer review scandal, involving a paper by Discoveroid senior fellow Stephen Meyer, which was slipped into print by Richard von Sternberg, who was then managing editor of the Proceedings of the Biological Society of Washington.

That’s all West copied from his creationist colleague — just a small collection of creationist gripes. If for some reason you want to read Smith’s entire blog article, go here: The New Inquisition: Ideology’s Corruption of Science.

So, dear reader, what have we learned from this? Well, we see how the Discoveroid mindset is — cough, cough — gaining momentum. What next? Maybe these guys will show that their ideas are winning even greater support — and to do that they’ll start quoting favorable comments from their own mothers.

Copyright © 2009. The Sensuous Curmudgeon. All rights reserved.

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apparently there has been a new study on that most magical of numbers, 7.  researches have long known about 7 (plus or minus 2) being the number the maximum number of things we can recall with short-term, or working, memory.  in this new study, however, researchers tried to create a model of brain activity to explain how the firing and suppressing of neurons involved in this process explains why it gets exponentially more difficult (for normal minds) to continue adding to this working memory.  it seems, as has been demonstrated repeatedly with human subjects, 7 seems to be the breaking point.  as the article states,

As a sentence or a string of numbers gets longer, it becomes exponentially harder for the excited cluster to suppress the others from firing, resulting in pathways that are weak or barely there. Recalling seven items requires about 15 times the suppression needed to recall three. Ten items requires inhibitory powers that are 50 times stronger, and 20 or more items would require suppression hundreds of times stronger still. That, Rabinovich explained, is normally not biologically feasible.

now, I’m not troubling myself with the details of the study here because it’s not what is interesting me right now.  instead, I’m thinking back to all the sermons heard and lessons learned in Sunday school about how 7 was the number of God.  7 days in creation, 7 days in the week, 7 days of Passover (ignoring that these are all pretty much the same thing…), 7 spirits of God, 7 churches in Asia,

the 10 commandments are found in the 70th chapter of the Bible (ignoring, of course, the later, sometimes arbitrary origin of those divisions), 7 loaves of bread,

7 deadly sins,

and so on.

of course, 7’s magicalness extends beyond the Bible: in addition to it simply being a lucky number, we have the 7 chakras in Hinduism, 7 heavens in Islam (as well as 7 fires of hell), Judaism’s 7-branched candelabrum (of the temple, not Hanukkah),

7 lucky Japanese gods of fortune

and, of course, the 7-layer whopper released in Japan last month.

so assuming that this new study is true — heck, let’s up the ante and say that the number 7 is not just the statistical average of things that can be held in short-term memory but in fact “written” into the brain’s hardwiring — I can’t help but think about how this story could and should be interpreted in light of the importance of the number in various cultures and their myths and religions.  one the one hand, there’s the could.  some people will surely see this as evidence that God — whose number is 7, remember? — created us in such a way that his number could be found implanted within our brains.  oh, the trickster!  glory!

on the other hand, there’s the should.  that the number 7 may be found across various cultures because of the structure of our brains.  now again, this is taking this study beyond face value and assuming way more than necessary, but it’s illustrative of a larger problem of how we interpret evidence.  for instance, you often hear about how the conditions on this planet, nay, universe, are perfect for life.  if the earth moved an inch in its orbit, we would all burn of freeze (nobody really knows the physics, they just know this).  everything we need for life and health is bountifully provided on the planet by the plants (and animals, if you’re one of those ).  and when we’re not inconsiderately interfering, the planet is fairly good at balancing itself out and maintaining homeostasis.  in short, clear evidence of design and of the hand of a beneficent creator.

the problem, of course, is that this type of thinking is backward.  it involves looking at the end product, irrespective of how it developed, concluding that things couldn’t have been any other way — that this was the intended product, or even the only imaginable one — and consequently marveling at the fact that conditions or means just happened to exactly what was necessary.  it entails looking first at the nutrients we need to develop and survive and then at what’s available in the world, which, lo and behold, match up quite nicely.  what are the odds?!  this is essentially how I learned to look at the world — excuse me, creation — growing up in church.  it is, like many other un or pseudoscientific views preferred by the church over time, alarmingly egotistic.

the correct view, of course, even crudely understood, is just the opposite.  the essential nutrients and conditions of life are not there to meet our needs as we are, but rather we are the way we are — and life is the way it is — because “we” evolved as we were able to break down those nutrients for energy and as “we” were capable of surviving — better, thriving — in those environments.  God didn’t create bluish/grayish eyes — much less give them specifically to me — so that people whom he wanted to live in cold environments with less sunlight could thrive; rather, the genetic mutation spread — and in recent evolutionary memory, at that — because of benefits for those who were already living in those environments.  I mean, that’s a pithy, pathetic explanation, but it’s immediately more reasonable that the former position, as humbling as that might be.

this doesn’t provide any really satisfying answer as to why the number 7 can be found in so many cultures, playing such an important role, but I’m not interested enough right now to sift through any explanations there might be.  plus, let’s not pretend that 7 is really that prevalent around the globe, or that it’s even all that important in the Bible.  rather, this is an instance of the human tendency to look for patterns and to bias all the instances of what we’re looking for — ignoring all the other numbers that are just as important/mundane.

Dr. Olivia Judson

IT is once more our delight, dear reader, to post about a column by the splendidly-evolved Olivia Judson — an evolutionary biologist and a research fellow in biology at Imperial College London. This article, part of Dr. Judson’s series in the New York Times, is titled: An Evolve-By Date. Here are some excerpts, with bold added by us:

We humans are busily changing the environment for most of the beings on the planet, and often, we are doing so very fast. To know what effect this will have, we badly need to know how readily different creatures can evolve to deal with changes to their environment. For if we’re not careful, many groups will soon be faced with an evolve-by date: if they don’t evolve rapidly enough to survive in this changing world, they will vanish.

That’s the way of the world. Most species have become extinct. Let’s read on:

The basis of evolutionary potential is clear enough in principle. Whether a population can evolve to cope with new circumstances depends on how much underlying genetic variation there is: do any individuals in the population have the genes to cope, even barely, with the new environment, or not? If not, everybody dies, and it’s game over. If yes, evolution may come to the rescue, improving, as time goes by, the ability of individuals to cope in the new environment.

Quite so. That’s how the game is played. We continue:

What determines the extent of the underlying genetic variation? Factors such as how big the population is (bigger populations usually contain more genetic variation) and how often mutations occur.

Right. The more, the merrier. Olivia then says:

Suppose you put bacteria into test tubes where their usual sugar source is in short supply, but an alternative one — which they can’t consume at all — is abundant. (If you put them with just this alternative source, they would all die of starvation at once.) Then, you can watch how long it takes for the bacteria to evolve so they can digest the alternative. The answer, in one famous case, was more than 31,000 generations! Which just goes to show: just because a particular trait would be useful does not mean that it will soon evolve.

A pessimistic result, but it was achieved with a limited population sample. Here’s Olivia’s concluding paragraph:

To me, all this is a bit sobering. If most organisms have to wait 31,000 generations to evolve a useful new trait — they will probably go extinct first. Worse, many natural populations are shrinking fast, further reducing their evolutionary potential. In short, we can expect that — if the environment continues to change as rapidly as it is at the moment — many creatures will fail to meet their evolve-by dates.

That’s the way it is. Out with the dinosaurs, in with the mammals. And speaking of mammals, isn’t Olivia the greatest?

Copyright © 2009. The Sensuous Curmudgeon. All rights reserved.

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Professor Dawkins makes a plausible case for militant atheism. I invite you to listen to the lecture. Do come back here to let us know what you think about it.

]]> http://gaffesociety.com/2009/11/29/the-greatest-show-on-earth/ Sun, 29 Nov 2009 01:41:46 +0000 Joseph http://gaffesociety.com/2009/11/29/the-greatest-show-on-earth/

Creationists fucking piss me off, man. Not because they’re idiots or because they believe what is clearly not true, but because they won’t fucking listen. They go back to their mantra of  “Show me your evidence”, to paraphrase the book, and won’t SHUT THE FUCK UP when you give them good reason. They’ve lost, but they still think they’re winning, and so more dumb-shit, didn’t-pass-year-9-science rednecks join the cult.

The opening line of the book is pretty great and sums up the importance of understanding evolution. “Imagine you are a teacher of Latin, anxious to impart your enthusiasm for the ancient world . . . yet you find your time continually preyed upon . . . by a  baying pack of ignoramuses who scurry about attempting to persuade your pupils that the Romans never existed. . . . That Spanish, Italian, French, Portuguese and their dialects sprang instantaneously into being, and owe nothing to any predecessor such as Latin.”

Consider the same scenario with modern history, with some smirking brat unashamedly shouting that the Holocaust never happened. Imagine that the prospective U.S. president, his soccer-mum ticket-sharer and the Pope are saying that the theory is equally as valid and should be given equal time to both theories. It’s a ridiculous scenario, but it’s the same type of situation that confronts science teachers the world over.

When they try to teach their students the essential and time-tested principle of evolution, they are met with the angry letters of the purposefully ignorant parents of aforementioned brain-washed children and the anxious grimaces of school principals pandering the the minority that wants its will pushed onto the majority, despite massive amounts of conclusive clinical test results, and far-reaching fossil records.

Dawkins’ new book calmly rebuts those he calls the history deniers, explaining the reasons that firstly, the creation stories told by creationists are impossible, and second, how evolution is the fact behind the existence of every living being on Earth, ever. The book charts the evolution of whales, humans, turtles and dogs, showing every step form one species to the next as well as the advantages of each subsequent adaptation. The book also follows experiments conclusively showing evolution over incredibly short geological timescales in clinical trials. The book also explains the supposed lack of “intermediates”, spouted by the people behind creationism.

The Greatest Show on Earth is a fascinating and persuasive read that brings together the threads of 150 years of evolutionary biology. Despite being an excellent book, I feel some of its value has been wasted from the start.

As Dawkins’ states, even when confronted with undeniable and conclusive evidence, creationists will invariably deny its validity, or even its existence, surprisingly enough. After denying it, they go back to their mantra of “Show me your evidence”, and stop short of putting their fingers in their ears and shouting, “LALALA I’M NOT LISTENING, I CAN’T HEAR YOU LALALALALA!”

In a particularly frustrating part of the book, Dawkins recounts an interview with Wendy Wright, essentially amounting to this:

Dawkins: Science.

Wright: Nazi, paedophile.

Dawkins: Science, here, evidence.

Wright: No it’s not.

And so it goes. For an hour.

As Dawkins states, Creationists choose not to believe the facts and aren’t likely to shift. Their logic system is too deeply rooted in superstition and religious lies to follow an argument built entirely with fact. The only people who will read  The Greatest Show on Earth are the ones who already have a basic understanding of evolution. This book may be excellent and persuasive, but as the saying goes, you can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make it drink. Still, that’s no reason to let the horse teach your children science.

Religion = The most insane thing ever made… believing in gods in 2009, that’s pure insane madness spiced with greed and selfishness..

YESTERDAY we posted Discovery Institute: Thrilled About ClimateGate, in which we showed that the neo-theocrats at the Discovery Institute’s Center for Science and Culture (a/k/a the Discoveroids) were gearing up to use the still-unfolding global warming email imbroglio as “proof” that brave dissenters from science orthodoxy have been suppressed by ideological conspirators.

Although not specifically expressed in the Discoveroid article we wrote about, the implication was that because the legitimate views of global warming skeptics had been suppressed, this means that all science dissent is similarly worthy, and therefore the irrational science-denial of creationists is somehow now respectable. We’re calling this interpretation of ClimateGate the “vindication of all kooks” doctrine.

Following that initial salvo, the Discoveroids have now posted a far stronger article at their blog. We’ve always told you what the Discoveroids were up to. Back when we started our humble blog we posted Discovery Institute: Enemies of the Enlightenment. But it’s no longer necessary to read between the lines. The Discoveroids are now out of the closet.

We present to you, dear reader, some excerpts from Climategate: a Word of Advice to the Scientists. The bold font was added by us:

[T]here will be an accounting for this [global warming] fraud. People are very very angry, and while the skeptics whose darkest doubts have been vindicated don’t pull the levers of organized science (the frauds do that), there are some financial and political resources available to the skeptics who have been demanding integrity in science, and they understand now that this is war.

Ah, “this is war.” Let’s read on:

A cabal of leading scientists, politicians, and media concubines have conspired to lie about global warming. The reasons are obvious: power and money. …

I’m not sure that the scientific community can or will respond to this debacle in a courageous or ethical way. The ID-Darwinism debate clearly demonstrates that venality and shameless self-interest, as well as a toxic leftist-atheist ideology, runs very deep in the scientific community.

There it is, right out in the open. We added color so you couldn’t miss it. The presumed vindication of global warming skeptics means the vindication of creationists too. Note that they persist with the goofy propaganda line that the “Darwinists” are all pushing a “toxic leftist-atheist ideology.” We continue:

Science surely provides much benefit to mankind, but we may need to pursue scientific truth with a different set of scientists than the ones we have now.

Right! Bring in the kooks who have been wrongfully “expelled.” Let’s make Ben Stein the new science czar. Here’s more:

Surely many many scientists knew of the frauds so clearly documented in the ClimateGate scandal; where were the august scientific organizations–the Royal Academy, the UN’s IPCC, the National Academy of Sciences, the American Association for the Advancement of Science–while this fraud was growing and gaining power. The obvious truth is that these citadels of organized science were part of the fraud, or at least acquiescent in it. Several of the admitted ClimateGate fraudsters were in senior positions in these organizations.

Those are the same institutions that scoff at creationism — for good reason — and the Discoveroids have long nurtured a deep hatred of them. You’ll see as the article continues:

We are on the verge of reorganizing our lives, our governments, and our economies on the basis of massive transparent scientific fraud. We may be able to avert more damage; I’m not sure. The bad guys here have all the influence and most of the money, and they are not hindered by ethics.

Perhaps so regarding global warming. We don’t really know yet. But we do know about the ethics of creationists. It’s certainly odd to see Discoveroids claiming to be the good guys, but that’s how they present themselves. Moving along:

What can we do? Criminal prosecution of scientists who manipulate data would be a good start. Scientists who fake data and manipulate peer review to advance their agenda are no different than corporate executives who manipulate stock prices or lawyers who tamper with juries.

Be careful, Discoveroids. That’s a two-edged sword. Remember that one of your own “senior fellows” was involved in the infamous peer review scandal. Well, that won’t be a problem when the Discoveroids take over. It was obviously the science fraudsters who kept that brilliant Discoveroid article from achieving legitimate status. Yes, that’s how they’ll handle it.

Here’s another excerpt:

Ultimately, perhaps massive defunding of organized science, and a new system of support for research that demands utter transparency and maximal accommodation of debate, may be the only way to defend ourselves from an utterly corrupt scientific elite.

Yes! Defund all of science! Verily, a new day is dawning, or so the Discoveroids hope. And now we come to the end of their revealing article:

It may well be that the public will be forced to protect itself from organized science, as we now protect ourselves from organized crime.

That’s the Discoveroid fantasy — scientists treated like Mafia dons, subjected to congressional hearings, courtroom inquisitions, expulsions from universities, purges from the peer-reviewed journals — it’s their sick dream of a Dark Ages restoration. Bring on the theocracy! Burn the witches!

Do you still have doubts about the goals of the Discoveroids? They’re going to ride the unexpected gift of ClimateGate as far as they can. What they couldn’t accomplish with their own nonsensical “science,” they now hope to achieve by exploiting the global warming scandal.

Please keep this in mind: It may be true that global warming is largely a scam, although it’s still early days and we really don’t know yet. Whatever we learn, whatever misdeeds are uncovered, if any, it shouldn’t affect the rest of science. And most assuredly it shouldn’t give any credibility to creationism — or to its stealth version, intelligent design.

Junk science should be treated as junk, whether it’s creationism or perhaps global warming. We already know that creationism is junk. Nothing we learn about global warming will change that.

Copyright © 2009. The Sensuous Curmudgeon. All rights reserved.

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WE present to you, dear reader, a letter-to-the-editor titled Darwinism leads to the devaluing of human life, which appears in the Springfield News-Leader of Springfield, Missouri, nicknamed “The Queen City of the Ozarks.”

We’ll copy most of today’s letter, omitting the writer’s name and city, and adding our Curmudgeonly commentary between the paragraphs.

The letter-writer begins by announcing that he’s responding to this earlier letter by Charles W. Hedrick, a professor at Missouri State University: God isn’t revealing public miracles. Then he says:

If you continue down the road with Dr. Charles Hedrick, here’s where you’ll go:

Scientific materialism and Darwinism (Charles Darwin, theory of evolution proponent) have negatively impacted theology and biblical studies by fostering a sense that the Bible is unreliable and that miracles are impossible (thus Dr. Hedrick’s view).

Surely that’s enough reason to reject “Darwinism.” But our letter-writer has only begun. Let’s read on:

Charles Darwin’s ideas devalue human life. For Darwin, the theory of evolution had a host of negative implications for mankind and for society: First, Darwin denied any concept of free will. Second, he believed that morality was “ultimately determined by reproductive success” and that morality could thus change in any way that ensures survival. Third, Darwin understood that his theory degraded human dignity.

As Captain Marvel used to say: Holy Moly! We continue:

A large part of the “Descent of Man” was made to argue that humans are not unique nor special. Darwin claimed that “there is no fundamental difference between man and the higher mammals in their mental faculties.” Further, Darwin argued that his theory explained why men of different races showed a disparity in mental abilities. Also, he wrote that human society was doing itself a disfavor by saving the weak members of society and letting them breed.

Multiple problems here — far more than we have time to chase down — including out-of context quotes, misunderstandings, and pure distortions. For example, how could Darwin simultaneously say that human races are mentally different, if he’s also saying our minds are the same as those of the higher mammals?

If you search for that quote, you can find it here, in Chapter 2 of Descent of Man. It’s where Darwin famously says that there’s virtually no difference between the minds of savages and civilized people. He then spends a lot of time discussing brains, a poorly understood subject at that time, and he said that all mammalian brains have more or less the same functions — sensory perception, maternal instincts, etc. Our letter-writer finds this offensive.

Here’s more:

Darwinian denial of free will led courts to treat criminal behavior as a disease because people cannot help doing what they are programmed by evolution to do.

Criminals are running loose because of Darwin! Moving along:

Concerning family life and human sexuality, Darwin argued that monogamy was useful for survival in 19th century Britain, but he admitted that marriage customs could change if necessary for survival. More recently, some Darwinists have even approved child molestations based on this principle.

Aaaargh!! Darwin and child molestation! That’s a new one. Another excerpt:

Darwin’s concerns about allowing the weak people in human society to breed led to the development of eugenics, a term coined by Darwin’s cousin, Francis Galton. This man also developed this practice of improving the human population by controlled breeding. Darwin’s reasoning has also been used to justify abortion.

Darwin the abortionist — what a letter! As for eugenics, we’ve previously debunked that here: Racism, Eugenics, and Darwin.

And now we come to the end:

It is very evident that many of these secularist/materialistic ideas are contained in the health care reform proposed by Congress. But, how many of these ideas are held by most Americans? Not by many of my friends and neighbors!

[Writer's name and city can be seen in the original.]

Wow! Our letter-writer concludes by blaming Darwin for the health care legislation now in Congress.

That guy Darwin — he sure did cause a lot of trouble.

Copyright © 2009. The Sensuous Curmudgeon. All rights reserved.

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Embrace it.

Must Not See TV

One of the first cliches they teach you to rid yourself of at all costs in Journalism 101 is to never begin a column with the dictionary definition of a word. It’s hack, it’s played out and almost as unoriginal as opening with a quote from Bartlett’s.

That said, I would be remiss not to start things off by pointing out that I commented to co-workers at the bookstore I work at that “going rogue” would make an ideal sexual euphemism. Yep, you guessed it: somebody else already stepped on my punchline.

As I’ve stated before in previous posts, I work selling books and coffee for a chain that rhymes with Barnes & Noble. (Shhh!) One of the many curious things that happened the day Sarah Palin’s biography was released was that we got a call or two about two separate parodies with the same title: “Going Rouge.” One is a coloring book, one is not. Both look hilarious in their own right; great title either way. What made this interesting to me personally is that it was impossible for us to order these books. One might even go so far as to posit this was done on purpose.

Which isn’t that paranoid a thought to think, believe it or not. After all, this is sadly not a tactic even confined to the right wing side of the political spectrum. I distinctly recall not being able to place any orders for Al Franken backstock after he secured the DFL nomination for Minnesota Senator. Being a fan of Franken’s comedy, this was more than a tad disheartening. That is the sort of cowardly behavior I would expect of pathetic Ann Coulter types.

And speaking of complete idiots, I wrestle now with the notion that even discussing Sarah Palin gives her more legitimacy than she actually deserves. Like my Mom always said: if you ignore them long enough they’ll leave you alone. After all, that’s the same rationale Richard Dawkins and Stephen Jay Gould employed by making the formal decision to never formally debate a creationist/intelligent designer. The more attention is paid to Palin, the more it appears she has something valid to contribute to political discourse. And IMOHO, she simply doesn’t have what it takes for heavy intellectual lifting.

But upon serious reflection, this is simply too juicy to ignore. The comedic possibilities are literally endless. It gets better every day. I’d stop just short of Dr. Hunter S. Thompson’s famous proclamation that it’s “better than sex.” Certainly not better than “going rogue.”

*rimshot*

I am he as you are he as you are me

It’s like you’re standing outside a fancy steakhouse just staring into the window, hungrily licking your chops while holding a pink slip and the personification of everything you believe is wrong with America offers you their leftovers. What’s a man to do, provided he’s not a vegetarian of course?  And where the hell is this nonsensical metaphor heading, you may ask? It’s leading you to news that the same man responsible for a quickie Palin election season parody helped edit her book. I mean, c’mon people! How in the Sam Hell did that happen? And why was I not contacted first? *sigh*

Now I realize it’s 100% unfair to automatically assume that if some of the people responsible for the book happening are unapologetic racists, that makes the Palin constituency automatically closet racists by proxy. That’s not the claim I’m trying to make here, not in the least. Hell, I’m sure a certain amount of hard core racists held their nose and voted for Barack Obama last November.  But the amount of backpedaling and censoring and video-taking-down and lawsuit-filing and such does make you wonder if these nagging allegations are substantive after all.

Credit DitchWalk for asking the question no one else seems to have the necessary cojones to ask: did Palin actually write any of this? Seriously, aside from submitting all the gory hunting party photos she happily posed in, what credit can she take for any of this?

Who cares, right? We’re pretty sure Teri Hatcher wrote hers and anything is better than that. I’d rather plod through Japanese stereo instructions than suffer through that that festering bowl of dog snot.

Wrong. Dead wrong with your Devil’s Advocate argument, dude.

It cheapens the definition of “truthiness” but that’s a boring barroom philosopher exercise. More importantly, it cheapens what I’m doing right now: writing.  The reason why my Journalism degree is worthless, the reason why the media industry has all but collapsed, the reason why I work 5 part time jobs without health care…it’s all because nobody’s figured out how to get paid to write after the Interweb Tubez up and changed the game. (With the noticeable exception of Vice.) If you say writing doesn’t count, it won’t count. If you say writing is a more of a hobby than a “real” job, than it will stay a hobby. If you believe writing doesn’t matter, it won’t matter. And where does that get us as a culture? Writing blogs no one reads, just another lonely dreamer’s voice in the wilderness that will never properly be heard.

Wow, that got a lot heavier than I originally intended. Sorry about that, everybody.

Schizopolis 4-Evah

Per usual, FunnyOrDie is THE clearinghouse to visit if you really want to beat a dead meme horse into the ground with a minimal amount of effort. My three current favorite Palin parodies are as follows:

1. Pageant tape with snarky MST3K commentary.
2. The Sarah Palin Show, with very special guest Sarah Palin. Only on Fox!
3. Godwin’s Law states, as we all hopefully know by now, that any position of strength is immediately negated the nanosecond you play the Hitler card. However, this sly spoof on the amazing-in-it’s-own-right 2004 German film “Downfall” is for the win, as the kids say nowadays.

No, I'm Spartacus!

In other news: the rumors of my demise have been greatly exaggerated. Also, apparently treating white kids like they are black kids works about as well as asking men to pretend to feel what it’s like to be a woman. Let’s see, what else? Oh yeah, my bio-fuels project is apparently moving along swimmingly. And in case you were looking for inarguably the worst commercial of all time, I already went to the trouble of finding it for you so you didn’t have to. But hey, things could always be worse: you could have gotten called onto the carpet to explain why exactly you green-lighted this bad boy to everyone in corporate.

This just in: Kanye West is a gay fish. Which is way better than Mormon vampire teen romance novels any old day of the week.

I’m out like Seacrest.

New one..

The room was dark and shadowy, almost symbolic that we were meeting in secret.  It was as if it wanted to protect and shield us from outsiders and other influences.  We were in the basement of Milk Bone Pickens High. The first meeting of the Beefy Snack Club was under way.

I didn’t expect to see new faces but sure enough, word had spread.  There was the usual motley crew that followed me around but now there was a Whippet named Gonzo.  He was quite vocal.

“We’re here because we all like snacks,” Gonzo began.  “I like pig ears. They’re delicious!”

Some dogs squirmed in their seats with some covering their eyes in disbelief.

“What?,” Gonzo replied with incredulity. “It’s both high in protein and satisfying to the palette.”

“We’re here because we like snacks but I’d like the club to be about something else,” Karma said softly.  Everyone turned their head to where she was sitting.  Even Gregio and Stella stopped biting each other’s snout in that friendly way Italian Greyhounds do. “I think an issue we can all agree on is abstinence.”

“No way, no how,” Luke, the captain of the Dog Squad, barked. “That’s a slippery slope, for sure.  Next thing you know it, you won’t want to teach Darwinism and replace it with lectures on Intelligent Design.  Besides, I like to get it on with the ladies!”

He held up a paw and gave a high five to Gonzo.  The other males around him howled in support and started wrestling, momentarily forgetting that we were in the middle of a meeting.

“The reason I think we should support it…,” Karma strained to get herself heard over the ruckus. “The reason I support it because it would cut down on puppy mills and unwanted dogs.”

This caught everyone off guard and quieted the room.  I was at the front, leading the meeting from a lectern and gave Karma a wink.  It was a smart rebuttal from a smart dog.

“On that same subject, I wonder how we evolved?,” Delfina inquired.

“Hey, Delfina has a good point,” Deja pounced into the conversation. I had no idea what she saw in it.  Even Mea stopped giving herself a bath to listen.  “We aren’t human, we’re just dogs… canines.”

“Yeah, so what’s your point?,” Mea asked.

“Don’t you guys get it or wonder about it all?,” Deja said excitedly. “Where did we get our canine consciousness?  How are we able to have thoughts, emotions and form rational, logical ideas?  How in the world can we even speak let alone live these types of lives?”

I hadn’t even thought about that before.  How is it that we live in a constructed society and live a normal life?  It’s not normal and had to come from somewhere.  Not every dog is able to do what we can do.

“I think I know, I think I know!,” a voice said from the back.  It was Zoey and she was hidden behind the others.  “We all drank from a magic water dish.  Like the fountain of youth.”

This was followed by guffaws and chuckles with some shaking their heads at the idea.  But it was intriguing and even a bit mystical.  How did we get here and what was our origin?  How could we conduct ourselves and speak while others couldn’t? Plus, isn’t high school all about self discovery?

“I like the idea and the constitution of the Beefy Snack Club shall be founded on the origins of canine consciousness,” I said, raising the gavel above my head.  “All those in favor, bark once.  Opposed, bark twice!”

A deafening bark of approval filled the room and I pounded the gavel on the lectern.  The Beefy Snack Club was born.

My holiday week reading time has been somewhat … varied.  I began the week by continuing a book titled Benedict Arnold and His Navy, but I quit reading it midway through as I found nothing that I haven’t read before in other books (mostly from my favorite historical fiction author, Kenneth L. Roberts in Rabble in Arms).  Not able to tolerate the idea of not reading, I picked up the most recent Philosophia Christi journal (the journal of the Evangelical Philosophical Society) and began reading an article by Stephen Palmquist titled “Toward a Christian Philosophy of Work: A Theological and Religious Extension of Hannah Arendt’s Conceptual Framework.”  This article piqued my curiosity as I’ve recently mulled over whether our work (a rather vague word, but I’ll hopefully write more on this later) is somehow tied into our being created in the image of God.  While Palmquist says much in his article, what struck me was his linking work and leisure together, and how our culture (or capitalism itself?) has construed a false dichotomy of one’s activity being either work or leisure.

Another book I’ve picked up is Robert J. Sawyer’s Calculating God.  Sawyer is the author of Flash Forward, which is now a television series on ABC that is Lost-esque.  I didn’t see the book Flash Forward at Half Price Books today, but saw another Sawyer book titled Calculating God, a book in which a paleontologist in Toronto is visited by an alien seeking to study fossil records on earth as part of his (it’s?) study of evolution.  Weird enough, I know.  However, what this alien seeks to convince the paleontologist of is the fact of Intelligent Design and the existence of God (of the Christian God?  Not sure yet).

Only 92 pages into the book, the picture I get so far is that the alien is a Theistic Evolutionist that holds our universe  along with all other universes have been created with a purpose, share many characteristics, and have evolved over billions of years.  The alien points to the precise design of the universe to ultimately point to a Designer, Who is God.  Up to this point, I’m beginning to think the alien believes at the very least in God as revealed in the OT (no mention of God as savior).  HOWEVER, a new twist has just been made in that the universe is closed, where science explains the world we live in, can lead one to belief in God, AND is even the reason for God’s existence.  UGH!

Is this really sci-fi and not just some cheesy Christian attempt at relevant fiction?  I hope to write more later, if I finish the book.  One think sticks out to me, however, and that is the vehicle fiction of any type serves to teach and expound the philosophies and theologies (or atheologies) of a particular time, society/culture, or individual. Fiction isn’t just made up stories!

Some time ago, George Gilder (surprise, he’s not just a technology guy) wrote the following:

Our high schools are among the worst performers per dollar in the world – especially in math and science. Our biology classes, in particular, espouse anti-industrial propaganda about global warming and the impact of DDT on the eggshells of eagles while telling just-so stories about the random progression from primordial soup to Britney Spears. In a self-refuting materialist superstition, teachers deny the role of ideas and purposes in evolution and hence implicitly in their own thought.

The Darwinist materialist paradigm, however, is about to face the same revolution that Newtonian physics faced 100 years ago. Just as physicists discovered that the atom was not a massy particle, as Newton believed, but a baffling quantum arena accessible only through mathematics, so too are biologists coming to understand that the cell is not a simple lump of protoplasm, as Charles Darwin believed. It’s a complex information-processing machine comprising tens of thousands of proteins arranged in fabulously intricate algorithms of communication and synthesis. The human body contains some 60 trillion cells. Each one stores information in DNA codes, processes and replicates it in three forms of RNA and thousands of supporting enzymes, exquisitely supplies the system with energy, and seals it in semipermeable phospholipid membranes. It is a process subject to the mathematical theory of information, which shows that even mutations occurring in cells at the gigahertz pace of a Pentium 4 and selected at the rate of a Google search couldn’t beget the intricate interwoven fabric of structure and function of a human being in such a short amount of time. Natural selection should be taught for its important role in the adaption of species, but Darwinian materialism is an embarrassing cartoon of modern science.

What is the alternative? Intelligent design at least asks the right questions. In a world of science that still falls short of a rigorous theory of human consciousness or of the big bang, intelligent design theory begins by recognizing that everywhere in nature, information is hierarchical and precedes its embodiment. The concept precedes the concrete. The contrary notion that the world of mind, including science itself, bubbled up randomly from a prebiotic brew has inspired all the reductionist futilities of the 20th century, from Marx’s obtuse materialism to environmental weather panic to zero-sum Malthusian fears over population. In biology classes, our students are not learning the largely mathematical facts of 21st-century science; they’re imbibing the consolations of a faith-driven 19th-century materialist myth.

I have been making the assertion lately that the materialist-atheist worldview is incoherent.  In saying so, I am not calling names or just being antagonistic.  I am saying that is does not cohere.  I am stating an opinion that I am hoping will invite some intelligent exchange.

What are the possible explanations for “human consciousness” that support an atheistic worldview?  Does the mere fact that we have bigger brains than “other animals” explain how thought itself comes about?  If abiogenesis can explain (and I do not believe it ever will) how the first life forms came to be by natural forces, how will we explain human thought?  How will we explain the information coding present in every cell – coding so complex that no existing computer technology even comes close.

And what explanation can there be for the cause of the so-called big bang?  And how can we ignore the elephant in the room that no explosion ever produced order.  Yet in our universe, we have mind-boggling degrees of order.

So why do we persist in twisting ourselves up into knots in order to make reality fit into our “God is myth” view of reality?  Intelligent design is at least worthy of further scientific study.   Darwinism requires at least as much faith as Deism.  By their abject refusal to accept either possibility, well-intentioned groups of people stifle creative thought and keep the world engaged in the biggest wild goose chase of all time!

Michelangelo’s inspiration was his belief, as he put it:

 ”Whatever beauty here on earth is seen,

To meet the longing and perceptive eye,

Is semblance of that source divine,

From whence we all come.

In this alone we catch a glimpse of Heaven.”

Truly paradise is right here….

The Environment in it’s good state and splendid qualities, much like Art has an intrinsic value for human civilization and a deep value for people and other species. Preservation is a mandate for all faiths and unfaiths.

Q.E.F., for the Creationists, It  has a religious value because it is the only way to glimpse the divine intention…
 knowing that God exists because the environment is too improbable to have evolved by pure chance;  Believe me.

Faith involves no proof. 

Both teleology and intelligent design principles are clearly at work here but the Evolutionists can’t be left unsatisfied either. All products of natural selection are favoured in the healthy environment

Q.E.D., For the Big Bang theorists.  The environment  has the scientific value of living in the present magnificent natural process of Evolution…

And for the Philosophers just being in the present is a pleasurable environment.

We’ve been pretty quiet about the global warming email imbroglio. That’s because we don’t yet know what these revelations mean — if anything. As always, we’re prepared to follow the evidence; but we’d like to make our own informed judgment, rather than leaping on the nearest bandwagon. Let the truth be known.

If it turns out that the global warming boys are a bunch of slime-balls, so be it. Let them be dealt with accordingly. If they’re all honorable scientists, that’s okay too. We’d prefer it, actually, because we have no wish to learn that scientists have been misbehaving. But our reaction won’t be based on ideology. Either way, we can handle it. If the globe really is warming, and if it’s our fault, we’ll accept the science; but we’ll continue opposing the political solutions now being proposed.

Speaking of ideology, we’ve known since this affair first erupted that every kook, every witch doctor, every Nostradamus buff, every purveyor of pyramid power, crop circles, UFO abductions, and — most assuredly — every creationist would be leaping with joy, claiming that the misconduct of the climatologists is “proof” that their own little niche of kookdom has also been suppressed by conspirators. But this scandal, if it turns out to disgrace the climatologists, won’t validate the ravings of all the maniacs in the world.

And that brings us to our topic for today. As we knew would happen, the neo-theocrats at the Discovery Institute’s Center for Science and Culture (a/k/a the Discoveroids) are jumping on the “vindicated kooks” bandwagon. We present to you, dear reader, some excerpts from At Least The ClimateGate Scientists Didn’t Admit Going to Church, which appears in the Discoveroid blog. The bold font was added by us:

The silence of the ‘pro-science’ blogsphere on the ClimateGate scandal is remarkable.

That’s how it starts. The apparently delusional Discoveroid writer is gloating that the science blogs are silent about ClimateGate because we’ve all been caught in a giant conspiracy — not only lying about global warming — but also, by implication, we’ve been lying about “Darwinism.” Let’s read on:

For years, readers of Pharyngula, Panda’s Thumb, Neurologica, WhyEvolutionIsTrue, Denialism, Respectful Insolence, and other militantly ‘pro-science’ blogs have been treated to rants about the need to protect the integrity of science from frauds and ideologically motivated practitioners.

The Discoveroid doesn’t mention your humble Curmudgeon in that group, and understandably so. We’ve always been out of step, politically, but we too have “ranted” about ideologically motivated fraud, because that’s what creationism is all about. We continue:

Of course, ‘protection of the integrity of science’ in the faux ‘pro-science’ blogsphere has generally meant suppression of skeptics who question so-called ‘consensus science’ on Darwinism and on Anthropogenic Global Warming. ‘Protection of science’ has more often that not entailed personal invective, recourse to ‘consensus’, advocacy of professional destruction of skeptics, deference to scientific authorities, censorship, and judicial coercion.

Observe how all the bitterness and resentment caused by a lifetime of professional ridicule comes pouring out of the Discoveroid’s pen.

“Suppression of skeptics”? “Consensus science”? Maybe that’s been a failing in global warming, we’re still not sure. It wouldn’t surprise us, because we’ve always suspected a political agenda there. If global warming turns out to have been an ideological and political snake pit, we won’t hesitate to agree that it’s a disgrace — but none of that will help the creationists.

Creationists have no suppressed data, no research worthy of publication, and no scientific theory. Creationists will not be liberated from the dungeon into which the “Darwinists” have allegedly cast them, because that dungeon is of the creationists’ own making — it’s the natural and entirely voluntary habitat of pseudo-science. The global warming skeptics may indeed have something of value to tell us; the creationists don’t and they never did. That’s the difference.

It’s amusing to see the creationists leaping to position themselves alongside the climate warming skeptics — as if the two groups had anything in common regarding the validity of their science. But nothing like the alleged misconduct in climatology has been happening in the biological sciences. In biology, the coercion has all been on the other side, first by attempting to outlaw the teaching evolution, then to force creationism into the classroom, and more recently to suppress research that creationists deem blasphemous.

We’ll skip over most of the Discoveriod article because it’s boring, and we’ll get right to the core of the Discoveroid’s kook-validation argument:

[W]hen the integrity of a major field of global science is destroyed — not threatened, but destroyed — by smoking-gun evidence of massive systematic scientific misconduct and fraud, the ‘pro-science’ blogsphere gets writer’s cramp. Dead silence.

That may be so. We don’t know because we don’t routinely survey the opinions of other science blogs. We’ll let them work it out. It doesn’t matter. Whether or not the climate warming boys are guilty of misconduct, creationism is bunk and it always has been. That includes the clumsily (and not very convincingly) secularized version of creationism known as intelligent design.

If the global warming skeptics turn out to have been right all along, then watch for the creationists to claim vindication for their unscientific mumbo-jumbo. But it won’t work for them any more than it will work for the Time Cube. Whatever happens with the global warming scandal, the earth does not have 4 simultaneous days in one Harmonic Time Cube, and creationism is pseudo-scientific nonsense.

[Update: Discovery Institute: The Mask Falls Away.]

Copyright © 2009. The Sensuous Curmudgeon. All rights reserved.

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One of the major problems with most religious people who try to launch an offensive against evolution is that they don’t have a clue what it is. You don’t need to get a degree in biology or even read a biology textbook. But, you should at least familiarize yourself with some of the basic concepts and sources of evidence for what you are trying to argue against. Otherwise, you end up making a complete fool of yourself.

Religious zealotry and ignorance of science can lead to some amazingly ridiculous questions. Today I was asked, “Why do we have to use science? Can you explain why we are eating pizza right now with science?”. Clearly, the person asking the question was not trying to seek the truth. He was creating a smokescreen to try and hide from the truth.

The main difference that separates science (e.g. evolution) and pseudo science (e.g. CrIntelligent Designism) is the process in which they arrive at conclusions. In science a hypothesis is made and observations are collected; if the observations support the hypothesis then the theory is accepted, otherwise, a new hypothesis needs to be made. However, with pseudo-science a conclusion is already presumed. Only observations that support said conclusion are collected and those that refute it are ignored.

Those who question the validity of science really need to wake up and take a look at the world they live in. Every day you take advantage of all the advancements and innovations made possible only with science. You have no problem with science when it comes to your computer, cell phone, car, medicine, contact lenses, clothes, and so on ad infinitum, but when it conflicts with your presumed conclusions you deny its usefulness. If that isn’t mental gymnastics I don’t know what is.

This guy leads an extremely busy life. I know he is promoting his recently published books The Greatest Show on Earth and consequently gets into book tours. But his publishers certainly work him hard.

Next March (Wednesday 10th) he is speaking in Wellington during the Writers and Readers Week at the NZ International Arts Festival (see Richard Dawkins in Wellington next March). Just announced is an appearance in Auckland on Saturday 13th March. But on Sunday 14th March he will also be speaking at the Global Atheist Convention in Melbourne!

I am a little bit younger than him but I couldn’t stand that pace.

Anyway, details of the Auckland appearance are:

Saturday 13th, march, 2010

The University of Auckland Fisher & Paykel Auditorium, Owen G Glenn Bldg, 12 Grafton Rd, Auckland

Richard Dawkins LIVE! The Greatest Show on Earth

The University of Auckland is pleased to present one of Britain’s foremost science writers Richard Dawkins in his only Auckland appearance.

Richard Dawkins will be introduced by Brian Boyd, The University of Auckland’s Distinguished Professor of English. He teaches a course in Literature and Science that includes Richard Dawkins’s The Blind Watchmaker.

About Richard Dawkins
Richard Dawkins will present evidence for his argument that evolution is an incontrovertible fact. In his new book The Greatest Show on Earth: The Evidence for Evolution, the renowned evolutionary biologist and outspoken atheist takes on creationists, including followers of “intelligent design” and all those who question evolution through natural selection.

Tickets will be available from iTicket (go to RICHARD DAWKINS LIVE! – iTICKET). The Auckland Alumni pre-sales have sold out but you can pre-register for sales to the general public starting November 30th.

I wonder where else in New Zealand he will speak?

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