Sometimes Nobel winners do stupid things . . .

October 18, 2007

. . . and then other people who are expert in the field kick their butts.

No, I’m not talking about Al Gore. James Watson, the co-discoverer of the structure of DNA, recently insulted the entire continent of Africa, and a good bunch of North and South America, and western Europe. No, Dr. Watson, race is not a predictor of intelligence.

Greg Laden provides the boot action at his blog, Evolution. Bookmark it. As certain as your heritage is passed to your children by a double-helix structure in the structure of your cells, some fool will repeat Watson’s argument. Veterans of quote-mine wars warn that creationists right now are filing the statement away for use in some future debate, where they will claim falsely that “the science of genetics is evil because it promotes racism.”

So keep that Laden piece handy.

And if all of this is news to you as a social studies teacher? Read the piece thoroughly. Check out Laden’s links, ask questions if you’re unclear on anything he says. Laden takes questions. P. Z. Myers takes questions (and a tip of the old scrub brush to Pharyngula for point out Laden’s post). Comments are open here.

See, this is how science and free discussion work: People get awards for the good ideas they have, and they pay the price for stupid ideas. Discussion, among the experts, is based on real data, real research. Ideas win when they have the data to back them up, not on the word of some authority, regardless whether the authority is well schooled, of the right or far-right political party, or supernatural.

It’s a model for our students.

__________________________

Update:  Even more from Mr. Laden, as he notes in comments.  You have plenty of bookmarks available, right?

6 Comments | Brain development, Brain learning, Citizenship, Civil Rights, Ethics, Evolution, Learning, Rampant stupidity, Reason, Teaching | Tagged: , , , | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

Hoax quote collections: Quote mining Hillary Clinton

October 17, 2007

We’re past the political equinox in the political hemisphere (not to be confused with any real equinox anywhere), and we’re coming down to silly season in the presidential race. Soon the hoax quotes will start appearing in full breeding plumage, to be beaten to death by unsuspecting candidates who wish to instill fear in voters, and by partisans who would rather give a tweak to someone they don’t like, rather than get their facts straight.

Remember when the oral faux pas of former Vice President Dan Quayle went around the internet — attributed instead to Al Gore? Yeah, that’s the sort of bird we’ll see. (To be fair, we should note that some of the Quayle quotes are invented, and they were also attributed to George W. Bush, and then to John Kerry; watch for them sometime in 2008.)

How do I know the misquote mocking birds will sing? I’ve already seen one bird, with sightings claimed by dozens of non-thinkers in the blogside. Hillary Clinton’s victory at the 2008 Democratic Convention is so much assumed that people are already staking claims on quote mines, pulling out nuggets of disinformation. In one “quiz,” quotes are listed, and the reader — that would be you or me, Dear Reader — is asked to select who might have said the disgusting thought, Hitler, Stalin, Idi Amin, Nikita Kruschev, the Devil Himself (just kidding), or “None of the above.” Each quote’ s “correct” answer is then revealed to be “none of the above,” because Hillary Clinton said it.

SEn. Clinton at Iowa rally, January 2007 - Reuters photo

For those who may doubt, a date is attached to each “quote.”

  • Photo: Sen. Hillary Clinton at a campaign rally in Iowa, January 2007 – Reuters photo.

You can see this one coming from miles away: Clinton’s quotes are true quote mine nuggets, ripped out of context, disguised with odd dates and no other details, and edited so a discerning reader cannot track them down to expose the fraud by the makers of the quiz (who was identified as Neal Boortz in one piece I saw but I haven’t been able to find his version).

We’ll take a more rational, hoax-debunking view below the fold. You can bet that Hillary Clinton didn’t take the Idi Amin-Stalin-Mao-Hitler view. You can take that to the bank.

Read the rest of this entry »

32 Comments | Bad Quotes, Bogus history, Ethics, Hoaxes, Politics, Voodoo history | Tagged: , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

They do as you do, not as you say

October 13, 2007

If you were wondering whether it’s still true that kids watch what you do rather than listen to what you say — yes, it’s still true. It’s more important to walk the walk than talk the talk — Gallup Management Journal features an article emphasizing the phenomenon, “The Sixth Element of Great Managing”:

One of the most powerful discoveries about how humans understand the world around them came about by accident. In the early 1990s, a group of researchers led by Dr. Giacomo Rizzolatti, a neuroscientist at the University of Parma in Italy, placed small electrodes in the brains of monkeys near the regions of the brain responsible for planning and carrying out movements. If the monkey picked up something, an electronic monitor that was connected to the wires in the animal’s brain would sound — “brrrrrip, brrrrrip, brrrrrip” — to register the firing of those neurons.

Then something happened — something so unusual that the researchers thought it had to be a mistake. If the monkey saw one of the scientists doing something — eating an ice cream cone, picking up a peanut or raisin, grabbing a banana — the monitor registered the firing of brain cells as if the monkey had done it, when all the animal did was watch.

“It took us several years to believe what we were seeing,” Rizzolatti told The New York Times. The structure behind the phenomenon was discovered to be what they called “mirror neurons,” cells scattered throughout key regions of the brain that mimic everything the monkey sees another do.

Subsequent research found a far more complicated set of mirror neurons in people. This “human see; human do” circuitry is believed to be why a yawn can be contagious, why even a newborn will stick out her tongue if she sees someone else do it, and why American boys sometimes mimic the idiosyncrasies of their favorite baseball players at bat. “It explains much about how we learn to smile, talk, walk, dance, or play tennis,” said a 2006 cover article in Scientific American Mind magazine.

If you want your students to be good at map reading, they need to see you reading maps. If you want your students to read, they need to see you read. The “mirror neurons” phenomenon should affect the strategies we use in the classroom.

File this under the “nothing new under the sun” category, or “oh, yeah, now I remember!”

1 Comment | Brain development, Brain learning, Education, Ethics, Learning, Learning styles, Teaching | Tagged: , , , | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

Take Ben Stein’s brain

September 27, 2007

 

Ben Stein in a tub of money

Cornelia Dean’s article in the New York Times on September 27 reports that several scientists got the same deceptive invitation to appear in a documentary movie that has not been made, but instead discovered themselves in a different movie, a sort of mockumentary in support of the discredited concept of intelligent design.

Actor/comedian/lawyer/economist Ben Stein is the producer and narrator of “Expelled!” P. Z. Myers kicked off the blog discussions when he noted his own appearance in the movie, not exactly what it was billed — Myers posted the invitation letter, related the story, and eventually posted the kiss-off letter from the producer, who seems too embarrassed to talk about his deceptive actions.

One has to wonder, is such a vanity production in defense of voodoo science the best use of Ben Stein’s money? Is it the best use of Ben Stein’s brain? What was he thinking?

Let the record note: Scientific contributions from intelligent design and the rest of creationism, for 2007 and 2008, was a mockumentary movie, based on deception-obtained interviews.

Is that what they want us to teach the kids in high school?

Also see:

Image: AV Club.com

 

Leave a Comment » | Bogus history, Creationism, Ethics, Intelligent Design, Voodoo science | Tagged: , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

Evolution avoidance syndrome

September 9, 2007

Scott Lanyon is director of the University of Minnesota’s Bell Museum of Natural History in Minneapolis. He writes regularly in the museum’s newsletter, Imprint. His latest column addresses the reluctance of scientists and teachers to use the word “evolution” even when their topic hits directly on it.

Evolution Avoidance Syndrome
By Scott Lanyon
Summer 2007

We have yet another invasive species in the Upper Midwest to worry about these days with the discovery of viral hemorrhagic septicemia virus (VHSv) in inland waters of Wisconsin. VHSv follows in the proud tradition of the zebra mussel, sea lamprey, a variety of carp species, Eurasian watermilfoil, purple loosestrife, curl-leaf pondweed, buckthorn, amur maple, a variety of thistle species, earthworms, gypsy moths, West Nile virus, soybean rust, and other pests that have been introduced to our region and that are causing great harm to our natural areas and our economy.

Read the rest of this entry »

8 Comments | Accuracy, Biology, Education, Ethics, Evolution, History, Research, Science | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

Blog for the environment: Blog Action Day, October 15

September 8, 2007

Blog Action Day, October 15: Organizers hope to have as many as 10,000 blogs writing about environmental issues and environmental action.

Blog Action Day 2007, the environment

If you blog, perhaps you could join in. If you read and comment only, feel free to urge others to join in.

It’s headed up by a bunch from downunder. U.S., Canadian and Mexican bloggers haven’t got on the bandwagon a lot, yet. As the organizers describe it:

On October 15th – Blog Action Day, bloggers around the web will unite to put a single important issue on everyone’s mind.

In its inaugural year, Blog Action Day will be co-ordinating bloggers to tackle the issue of the environment.

What Each Blogger Will Do

Bloggers can participate on Blog Action Day in one of two ways:

  1. Publish a post on their blog which relates to an issue of their own choice pertaining to the environment.For example: A blog about money might write about how to save around the home by using environmentally friendly ideas. Similarly a blog about politics might examine what weight environmental policy holds in the political arena.Posts do not need to have any specific agenda, they simply need to relate to the larger issue in whatever way suits the blogger and readership. Our aim is not to promote one particular viewpoint, only to push the issue to the table for discussion.
  2. Commit to donating their day’s advertising earnings to an environmental charity of their choice. There is a list of “official” Blog Action Day charities on the site, however bloggers are also free to choose an alternate environmental charity to donate to if they wish.

And that’s it.

A gentle nudge to a better planet. Seems like a good idea to me.

Tip of the old scrub brush to Meeyauw.

4 Comments | Climate change, Conservation, Dust Bowl, Environmental protection, Ethics, Free market economics, Geography - Economic, Geography - Physical, Global warming, Globalization, Natural history, Natural resources, Nuclear power, Politics, Weblogs | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

You had to be there

August 25, 2007

Jim Easter at Some Are Boojums wondered what it would look like if we assumed in history what creationists claim about biology, geology, paleontology, archaeology and astronomy — “No one alive today was there, so no one can say what happened.”

His detailing of the “10 Questions to Ask Your History Teacher” is a parody of Jonathan Wells’ attempt to get kids to tell biology teachers that biology is hoakum. It’s worth a read again, since the issue heats up again at the Texas State Board of Education.

Get ready, history teachers: Here come the kids with the questions!

1 Comment | Creationism, Darwin, Ethics, George Washington, Historic documents, History, Voodoo history, Voodoo science | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

Dutch creationists pay to keep evolution off television

August 20, 2007

Here’s an interesting tactic Dutch Christians seem to have picked up from Adnan Oktar: If you don’t have a rebuttal to evolution, buy the rights to the information and cover it up.

It’s a commercial/religious twist on what Richard Nixon tried to do, but this may be legal. Will it work? Can Christians, or Moslems, purchase the rights to the truth, to keep it from being broadcast?

David Attenborough is famous for his nature programs, usually produced for the British Broadcasting Company (BBC) and often broadcast in the U.S. on Public Broadcast System (PBS) stations. An evangelical Christian television network in the Netherlands purchased the rights to one of Attenborough’s latest productions, The Life of Mammals, but has edited out all references to evolution.

Are the edits significant? See for yourself:

Comparative clips of the English and Dutch versions can bee seen at Cloggie.

MediaWatchWatch.com reports the move may be pointless, since many Dutch homes have BBC on their cable systems.

Still, with Adnan Oktar spending millions to publish and distribute widely a grotesquely inaccurate book on evolution (unholy to do such things, Adnan – really!), with Texas’s State Board of Education chaired by a hard-headed creationist, one does tire of the creationists’ tendencies to try to purchase the right to be stupid, and then force that stupidity on others.

Why not just stick to the facts? What’s so wrong about letting the truth out? What’s so wrong with the truth that religious fanatics will spend millions to cover it up?

Richard Nixon’s ghost is slapping Santayana’s ghost on the back, asking him to join in on the joke. Santayana’s ghost is not laughing.

More information:

2 Comments | Accuracy, Adnan Oktar, Capitalism, Creationism, Ethics, Evolution, Santayana's ghost, Television | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

A religious bias against good higher education — in theology!

August 10, 2007

Some religious primary and secondary schools stand on the same, treacherous ground when it comes to curricula which deserve challenging. Castle Hills First Baptist School is not the only educational institution damning children with fool ideas.

Douglas Groothuis teaches at Denver Seminary. In his blog, Constructive Curmudgeon, he lists a set of “imperatives” that he presents annually to his class in “Christian Ethics and Modern Culture.”

Despite his imperative #9:

9. The biblical concept of truth is that a true statement corresponds with or matches objective reality. While human knowing is corrupted by sin, knowledge of the things that matters most—divine and human—is possible, desirable, and pertinent.

Groothuis continues to support and defend intelligent design, a position I find both contrary to his imperative #9, and unethical for anyone, especially Christians, in imperative #17:

17. The Intelligent Design movement is thrusting a wedge between empirical science and philosophical materialism such that the evidence for design in nature may emerge apart from dogmatic and a priori restrictions. Learn about, teach about, and support this movement. See William Dembski, The Design Revolution (IVP, 2004).

Groothuis is a genuine fan of Dembski and Jonathan Wells and all the folderol they can produce. Urging students who claim to be Christian to promote the falsehoods of intelligent design is not a major sin; it’s not so severe as coaching them on racism, genocide, murder, sexism, or disowning the poor. I fear, however, it is the seed of those greater sins. (Here’s a clue: Inter-Varsity Press (IVP) is not known for high standards on science, nor on theology, to some of us; but they are probably more reputable than Regnery publishing.) Intelligent design ideas trend to the fantastic, undesirable, and not relevant.

Shakespeare put the words in Hamlet’s mouth; if only philosophers today would pay them more attention:

There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio,
Than are dreamt of in your philosophy.

More things like: science, biology, real facts, and honesty and good faith.

What is it about philosophers (Dembski, Groothuis, others at DI)? Are they competing to become to literature and social sciences what engineers are to the sciences, with regard to creationism?

Leave a Comment » | Curricula, Education, Ethics, Intelligent Design, Religion, Science, Science and faith | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

Dodd, 1, O’Reilly, 0

August 6, 2007

Bloggernista linked to a video where Sen. Chris Dodd, D-Conn., pins Bill O’Reilly for his scurrilous attacks on bloggers.  O’Reilly fans shouldn’t watch.

Leave a Comment » | Accuracy, Dissent, Ethics, Politics, Weblogs | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

When things get tough, the patriotic listen to Barbara Jordan

August 2, 2007

Whose voice do you hear, really, when you read material that is supposed to be spoken by God? Morgan Freeman is a popular choice — he’s played God at least twice now, racing George Burns for the title of having played God most often in a movie. James Earl Jones?

Statue of Barbara Jordan at the Austin, Texas, Airport

Statue of Rep. Barbara Jordan at the Austin, Texas airport that bears her name. Photo by Meghan Lamberti, via Accenture.com

For substance as well as tone, I nominate Barbara Jordan’s as the voice you should hear.

I’m not alone. Bill Moyers famously said:

When Max Sherman called me to tell me that Barbara was dying and wanted me to speak at this service, I had been reading a story in that morning’s New York Times about the discovery of forty billion new galaxies deep in the inner sanctum of the universe. Forty billion new galaxies to go with the ten billion we already knew about. As I put the phone down, I thought: it will take an infinite cosmic vista to accommodate a soul this great. The universe has been getting ready for her.

Now, at last, she has an amplifying system equal to that voice. As we gather in her memory, I can imagine the cadences of her eloquence echoing at the speed of light past orbiting planets and pulsars, past black holes and white dwarfs and hundreds of millions of sun-like stars, until the whole cosmic spectrum stretching out to the far fringes of space towards the very origins of time resonates to her presence.

Virgotext carried a series of posts earlier in the year, commemorating what would have been Jordan’s 71st birthday on February 21. (Virgotext also pointed me to the Moyers quote, above.)

Now, when the nation seriously ponders impeachment of a president, for the third time in just over a generation, Ms. Jordan’s words have more salience, urgency, and wisdom. It’s a good time to revisit Barbara Jordan’s wisdom, in the series of posts at Virgotext.

“There is no president of the United States that can veto that decision.”

“My faith in the Constitution is whole.”

“We know the nature of Impeachment. We’ve been talking about it a while now.”

“Indignation so great as to overgrow party interests.”

And finally:

The rest of the hearing remarks are all here. It’s a longer clip than the others but honestly, there is not a good place to cut it.

This is Barbara Jordan on the killing floor.

This was a woman who understands history, who illustrates time and again that we are, with every action, with every syllable, cutting the past away from the present.

She never mentions Nixon by name. There is the Constitution. There is the office of the Presidency. But Richard Nixon the president has already ceased to exist. By the time she finishes speaking, he is history.

“A President is impeachable if he attempts to subvert the Constitution.”

Also see, and hear:

Virgotext’s collection of Barbara Jordan stories and quotes is an excellent source for students on Watergate, impeachment, great oratory, and Barbara Jordan herself. Bookmark that site.

Barbara Jordan, in a pensive moment, in a House Committee room

Rep. Barbara Jordan sitting calmly among tension, at a House Committee meeting (probably House Judiciary Committee in 1974).

Update 2019: Here is the full audio of Barbara Jordan’s speech. It is still salient, and if you listen to it you will understand better what is going on in Congress today.

Barbara Jordan, Statement on the Articles of Impeachment, at AmericanRhetori.com.

3 Comments | Barbara Jordan, Democracy, Ethics, Famous quotes, Free press, Good Quotes, Heroes, History, History audio sources, Justice, Leadership, Patriotism, Presentations, Presidents, Quotes, Reason, Scandals, Texas, Texas history, Texas Lege, U.S. Constitution, U.S. House of Representatives, Watergate scandal | Tagged: , , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

Nonqoute of the Moment: What Ben Bradlee did NOT say

July 27, 2007

My respect for Fred Gielow rose when I found this on-line erratum notice, correcting a vicious misquoting of former Newsweek columnist and Washington Post editor Ben Bradlee.

This is one way a responsible author corrects a misquoting of someone, particularly one that puts words in the person’s mouth that convey a message opposite to the message they delivered:

____________________________________

I have been advised by the assistant counsel at The Washington Post that Mr. Benjamin C. Bradlee, vice-president at-large of The Washington Post, never made the statement attributed to him on page 117 of my book, You Don’t Say. The principal source of that quotation is the book Trashing the Planet, by Dixy Lee Ray with Lou Guzzo, Regnery Gateway, 1990, page 76. The assistant counsel states the quote is a fabrication.

The assistant counsel tells me Mr. Bradlee says he was discussing a matter at an environmental conference with fellow panelists and had no problem with what the panelists were saying, but he warned that there was

“a minor danger in saying it, because as soon as you say, ‘To hell with the news, I’m no longer interested in the news, I’m interested in causes,’ you’ve got a whole kooky constituency to respond to, which you can waste a lot of time on.”

That statement is indeed significantly different in meaning from the statement I quoted from Trashing the Planet, which said,

“To hell with the news. I’m no longer interested in the news. I’m interested in causes. We don’t print the truth. We don’t pretend to print the truth . . .”

Inasmuch as Trashing the Planet cites as a reference for its quotation an article by David Brooks in the October 5, 1989 Wall Street Journal, and inasmuch as I now find that Wall Street Journal article contains wording wholly consistent with the first quotation (above), not the second, I’m led to believe the second quotation is in error. This is a difficult conclusion for me to reach because I greatly respect Dixy Lee Ray and Regnery Gateway, and I have great confidence in their integrity.

Nevertheless, I must now apologize to Mr. Bradlee and I must apologize to all readers of my book who have depended on the correctness of the quote I obtained from Trashing the Planet. As I have stated to the assistant counsel, I’m interested only in the truth. When it can be shown that I have relied on information or a quotation that is shown to be incorrect or improper, I am anxious to correct the record.

Once again, let my extend my most sincere and genuine apologies to Mr. Bradlee. It was never my intention to attribute to him something he did not say. I know how painful it is to be accused of something you did not do or say. I would not wish that pain on anyone. And to demonstrate my desire to disseminate this information to set the record straight, I will post this message on my website for an indefinite period of time and will highlight access to it.

Fred Gielow_____________________________[end quote from Gielow]

Mr. Gielow’s faith in the Regnery publishing house is misplaced, in my experience.

Now, perhaps Mr. Gielow will correct his misquoting of Charles Wurster at his website. [Update, 7-29-2007:  Mr. Gielow responds by e-mail that he will check out the citations of the Wurster misquote.  Good news.]

Leave a Comment » | Accuracy, Bad Quotes, Ethics, Famous quotes, Newspapers, Quotes | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

Collateral damage from magic bullets

July 22, 2007

In an earlier post I noted Norman Borlaug’s receiving the Congressional Gold Medal. In comments, Bernarda noted those who disagree with the claim that Borlaug’s Green Revolution was much of a benefit, or perhaps more accurately, those who note the problems that result from such advances — and there are many. Bernarda pointed to a BBC lecture from Vendana Shiva, detailing the problems that Punjab experienced as a result of governmental and society structures unable to deal with the changes required by high-yield crops: “Poverty and Globalisation.” It’s worth a read or a listen.
Similarly, in another BBC lecture in that series, Gro Harlem Bruntland details problems from “progress” that includes cutting the forests, in “Health and Population.” Relevant to other discussions here, she notes a rise in malaria due to deforestation, raising an issue that the junk science purveyors opposed to Rachel Carson’s honoring would like to ignore. Here is a small excerpt of her talk — note that deforestation is not a problem that more DDT can solve:

Gro Harlem Bruntland:  Recently, in Mozambique, I saw children with their eyes glazed with fever from a malaria that could have been prevented if their parents could afford bed nets. Deforestation had changed malaria from a nuisance to a curse in a matter of twenty years. 

Gro Harlem Brundtland, former Director General of the World Health Organization (WHO). Wikiquote image.

Gro Harlem Brundtland, former Director General of the World Health Organization (WHO). Wikiquote image.

More people are suffering from this killing and debilitating disease now than ever before, and deforestation, climate change and breakdowns in health services have caused the disease to spread to new areas and areas that have been malaria-free for decades, like in Europe.

In the Philippines, I have watched how beggars sit exhausted on the pavements convulsed with coughing. Tuberculosis, which we long believed had been brought under control by effective treatment, is on the rise again. Increasingly, we see forms of tuberculosis which are resistant to all but a very expensive cocktail of drugs.

I think that HIV/AIDS may be the most serious threat to face sub-Saharan Africa and other developing regions. space. Already, the AIDS epidemic is the leading cause of death in several African countries. AIDS has reversed the increases in life expectancy we have seen over the past thirty years. The social and economic devastation in countries that could lose a fifth of their productive populations is heart-rending.

I believe we are facing this alarming situation largely because of an outdated approach to development. Our theories have to catch up with what our ears and eyes are telling us – and fast.

There was a period in development thinking – not so long ago – when spending on public services, such as health and education, would have to wait. Good health was a luxury, only to be achieved when countries had developed a particular level of physical infrastructure and established a certain economic strength. The implicit assumption was that health was to do with consumption. Experience and research over the past few years have shown that such thinking was at best simplistic, and at worst plainly wrong.

I maintain that if people’s health improves, they make a real contribution to their nation’s prosperity. In my judgement, good health is not only an important concern for individuals, it plays a central role in achieving sustainable economic growth and an effective use of resources.

As in Europe at the end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th century, we have seen that developing countries which invest relatively more, and well, on health are likely to achieve higher economic growth.

In other words, malaria prevention grows on trees, or malaria grows with the cutting of trees.

1 Comment | Citizenship, Conservation, Current History, DDT, Disasters, Economics, Environmental protection, Ethics, Geography - Economic, Geography - Physical, Geography - Political, Globalization, History, Junk science, Public health, Rachel Carson, Research, Science, Travel, War on Science | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

Creationist fear to debate in the spotlight

July 12, 2007

How can we tell creationists and intelligent design advocates fear debating their ideas with scientists?

– Religious kooks send threatening notes to biologists at the University of Colorado.

– Other religious kooks contemptibly make excuses for the threats.

– Don’t take my word for it; read the things for yourself, and you decide.

Bug Girl lists several instances of threats against teachers of evolution. The phenomenon is not new, and does not appear to be decreasing (though not rampant, either — thank God).

Vox Day, Pat Sullivan, time to stand up for free debate, civilized answers, and no threats — where are you?

2 Comments | Accuracy, Citizenship, Creationism, Ethics, Intelligent Design, Science, Science and faith | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

Inexplicable insanity about DDT and Rachel Carson

July 3, 2007

Sheesh! I thought Rep. Rob Bishop, R-Utah, and Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Okla., pretty much took the cake in fanatical ideas close to insanity in the calumny campaign against Rachel Carson. I may have erred.

Please understand, it is important that good people speak up for science, for political sanity, for reason and reality. There are forces of ignorance and evil who willingly fill the information vacuum with excrement, and who thereby pollute political discourse — if you don’t speak up.

Here: Send Sen. Tom Coburn a note, tell him you think he should come to his senses and stop blocking a bill giving a minor honor to Rachel Carson. He needs to do the Christian thing and stand up for truth, for health care, for honesty, you should tell him. Here’s his official message-leaving site.

No, he’s not answered me, either. Swamp him with mail. Or telephone his office: 202-224-5754 (Washington, D.C. office).

Leave a Comment » | Accuracy, Bogus history, Citizenship, Conservation, DDT, Ethics, Natural history, Rachel Carson, Voodoo history, Voodoo science, War on Science | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

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