May 10, 2008
Richard Weikart is an arm of the Discovery Institute’s disinformation brigade. A couple of years ago he published a book attempting to link Darwin to the Holocaust in a blame-sharing arrangement. This book and some of its arguments appear to be the foundation of the text used to write the script for the mockumentary movie “Expelled!” featuring Nixon speechwriter Ben Stein.
Which is to say, the basis for the movie is dubious. Weikart’s scholarship creating links between Darwin, science and Hitler is quite creative. It is also based on arguments created from Darwin’s writings that mislead the innocent about evolution, science and history, or which get Darwin and evolution exactly wrong.
Michael Ruse published an op-ed in a Florida paper in February — a piece which is no longer available there (anybody got a copy? Nebraska Citizens for Science preserved a copy) — and Weikart responded, restating his creative claims. Alas for the truth, Weikart’s canards are still available at the Discovery Institute website, putting an interesting twist on Twain’s old line: The truth will go to bed at night while a falsehood will travel twice around the world as the truth kicks off its slippers.
Looking for Ruse’s piece, I found Weikart’s response here and here. I composed a quick response pointing out the problems, which I would like to posit here for the record — partly because I doubt Darwiniana gets much traffic, partly because the censor-happy folks at Discovery Institute don’t allow free discussion at their site, and partly so I can control it to make sure it’s not butchered as Weikart butchers Darwin’s text.
At Darwiniana I said:
Weikart’s strip quoting of Darwin is most disappointing. [Weikart wrote:]
Darwin claimed in chapter two of The Descent of Man that there were great differences in moral disposition and intellect between the “highest races” and the “lowest savages.” Later in Descent he declared, “At some future period, not very distant as measured by centuries, the civilised races of man will almost certainly exterminate and replace throughout the world the savage races.” Racial inegalitarianism was built into Darwin’s analysis from the start.
Darwin argued the differences in intellect and manners between the “highest” of men and the “lowest” of men did NOT change the fact that we are are all related — legally, Darwin’s argument would evidence a claim absolutely the opposite of what Weikart claims. Here are Darwin’s words from Chapter II of Descent of Man, as Darwin wrote them, without Weikart’s creative editing:
Nor is the difference slight in moral disposition between a barbarian, such as the man described by the old navigator Byron, who dashed his child on the rocks for dropping a basket of sea-urchins, and a Howard or Clarkson; and in intellect, between a savage who uses hardly any abstract terms, and a Newton or Shakespeare. Differences of this kind between the highest men of the highest races and the lowest savages, are connected by the finest gradations. Therefore it is possible that they might pass and be developed into each other. [emphasis added]
That’s not inegalitarianism at all — Darwin’s saying they are the same species, related closer than the poets allow. If we stick to the evidence, and [do] not wander off into poetic philosophy, we must acknowledge that Darwin’s own egalitarian spirit shows here in the science, too. It would be an odd kettle of fish indeed that a crabby guy like Hitler, who shared the antiscience bias of Weikart’s organization, would suddenly accept the science of a hated Englishman that ran contrary to his other philosophies. Who makes the error here, Hitler or Weikart? If they both think Darwin endorsed racism, they both do — but there is not an iota of evidence that Hitler based his patent racism on science, let alone the science of an Englishman.
As to the second quote, Weikart leaves the context out, and the context is everything. Darwin is not arguing that “savages” (the 19th century word for “aboriginals”) were less human, nor that they are a different species. He was arguing that in some future time there would appear creationists like Dr. Weikart’s colleagues at the Discovery Institute who will deny evolution because, once Europeans and others with guns conduct an unholy genocide (which Darwin writes against in the next chapter), and once humans wipe out chimpanzees, orangs and gorillas, the other great apes, the creationists can [then] dishonestly look around, blink their eyes and say, “Where are the links? There cannot be evolution between (Animal X) and humans!”
Darwin wrote:
At some future period, not very distant as measured by centuries, the civilised races of man will almost certainly exterminate, and replace, the savage races throughout the world. At the same time the anthropomorphous apes, as Professor Schaaffhausen has remarked (18. ‘Anthropological Review,’ April 1867, p. 236.), will no doubt be exterminated. The break between man and his nearest allies will then be wider, for it will intervene between man in a more civilised state, as we may hope, even than the Caucasian, [emphasis added] and some ape as low as a baboon, instead of as now between the negro or Australian and the gorilla.
In the end, Darwin wrote against genocide, against racism, and in favor of the higher thinking abilities of all dark-skinned people. He wrote in favor of Christian morality. Darwin himself remained a faithful, tithing Christian to the end of his life.
Such a man, and such amazing science, deserve accurate history, not the fantastic, cowardly and scurrilous inventions Dr. Weikart has given them. We should rise to be “man in a more civilized state” as Darwin had hoped.
Update, July 24, 2008, nota bene: To anyone venturing here from the Blogcatalog discussion on intelligent design: Get over to the site of Donald Johanson’s Institute for Human Origins, and especially look at the presentation “On Becoming Human.” Also check out the Evolution Gateway site at Berkeley, especially this page which explains what evolution is, and this page which offers some introduction for what the evidence for evolution really is. One quick answer to a question someone asked there: Between H. erectus and modern humans, H. sapiens, in the time sequence we have fossils of H. heidelbergensis and H. neanderthalensis. It’s pretty clear that Neandertal is not ancestral to modern humans, but instead lived alongside modern humans for 50,000 years or so from the Middle East through Southern Europe. To the question of actual transitional fossils, you’d need to hit the paleontology journals — there are a lot. You may also benefit from taking a look at the articles at this special Nature site.
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Accuracy, Bad Quotes, Charles Darwin, Creationism, Darwin, Education, Ethics, Evolution, Famous quotes, Genocide, History, Holocaust, Holocaust denial, Junk science, Lessons of history, Natural history, Quotes, Racism, Rampant stupidity, Science, Voodoo history, Voodoo science, World War II | Tagged: Ben Stein, Darwin, Education, Expelled!, Politics, Religion, Richard Weikart, Science | 
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Posted by Ed Darrell
May 6, 2008
Tom Gilson is a muck-a-muck with Campus Crusade for Christ, and though claiming he is Christian he has no compunction calling Charles Darwin an accessory to murder and otherwise promoting the canard that evolution caused Hitler to go nuts and murder millions.
Making the link to Hitler in an era when Godwin’s Law has a well-visited entry on Wikipedia imposes on one a duty to check the facts. Doesn’t faze Gilson: Damn the facts, full calumny ahead.
Which is worthy of comment at the moment only because he’s banned my comments. I was trying to figure out where he was coming from, and I followed his links to a column he wrote on Chuck Colson’s “Breakpoint” site, in which he discusses his struggles in debating scientists and others who understand evolution.
As one who does a lot of web-based debating against naturalistic (atheistic) evolution, I know I wouldn’t stand a chance if I weren’t studying what the best atheists and evolutionists have written, or without reading the most thoughtful Christian or ID-based responses.
The second protection against such an error is to know what we don’t know, and be willing to admit it. Evolution and ID involve specialized studies in paleontology, radiometric dating, geology, biochemistry, genetics, and more. Does ID challenge some of the prevailing wisdom in these fields? Yes. Can we read about these challenges on the web, or find a good, trustworthy book about them? Certainly! Will that make us qualified to “pronounce” on them? Well, no.
But that’s okay. We don’t all have to be experts. It will take many years (at least) for those who are to work out their differences. We can still know what we do know. We know that God created the heavens and the earth and all that lives in them. The details and the debates go far deeper than that. We should dive into these discussions only as deep as we’re prepared to swim—while at the same time always equipping ourselves to go to greater depths.
Excuse me, but I’d just come from another site that had the works of Hitler, discussing his own struggle — “mein kampf” in German. I noticed a few parallels, and I called attention to them, sorta hoping Gilson would blush and back away from the claims. Gilson’s stuff is mild, really. He’s got a tin ear for science and a very narrow view of history, it appears to me. Were he not so earnest in impugning others, I’d have just laughed it off completely. That’s what I expected him to do.
But no. He got huffy and banned me. Censorship, refusing to discuss with critics, are just tools Gilson has to use in his struggle against evolution. Only Tom Gilson can make wholly unsubstantiated claims in error against great men — no one else is allowed to question the Man Behind the Curtain.
If irony killed, there’d be no creationist left on Earth. If irony were science, creationism would win several Nobels a year. If irony were worth a pitcher of warm [spit], creationism would have a permanent hold on the vice presidency.
But irony is not a response. Ain’t it odd to hear these guys go on about their struggles, all the while they impugn the reputation of a good man like Charles Darwin, and all the time they have not got an iota of science to back up their position?
Gilson argues evolution played a role in the Holocaust. He’s not sure how, and he doesn’t know anything about what evolution theory is nor the history of the Holocaust, but he’s sure that if he just reads the Bible earnestly enough . . .
If this completely unsupportable claim is the best we can expect from creationists, isn’t it frightening that anyone gives them credence?
Gilson will see the links. Tom, if you come here, you’ll find someone who is willing to discuss with you your errors and why you should repent. Bet you won’t. Bet you can’t.
Update: P. Z. Myers found this guy, Jeff Dorchen. Gilson, he’s got Stein pegged, I think. What say you?
All Ben Stein would have had to say to support the Nazis back then is what he’s saying right now.
Shut up, Godwin.
Just because George W. Bush won’t be in office next year doesn’t mean we’ve dodged the bullet of a white Christian supremacist dictatorship. We are not out of the woods yet, my darlings. That a man, let alone a Jew, could, without shame, walk on the graves of Holocaust victims and claim the theory of evolution was at fault, let alone a man whose nationalism, social darwinism (which is not Darwinism, by the way), anti-intellectualism, and disregard for the truth are beyond doubt – it’s like some ghastly executioner’s joke. If the message of Expelled weren’t being taken seriously by a religio-political movement that has already caused two presidential elections to end in disaster, it would be merely obnoxious. Instead, it’s chilling.
Can he sink any lower? Never underestimate the depths of degradation a Ben Stein might sound. My money’s on Ben Stein to be the first human being to reach the Earth’s core.
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16 Comments | Accuracy, Creationism, History, Rampant stupidity, Religion, Science, Voodoo history, Voodoo science | Tagged: Creationism, Expelled!, Religion, Science, Voodoo history, Voodoo science | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
May 3, 2008
One of the ultimate defenses of creationism, once you’ve demonstrated that there is no science and no good theology in it, is the creationist claim “it doesn’t hurt anyone.”
Well, yes, it does. Over the years I’ve noticed that creationism appears to suck the intelligence right out of otherwise smart or educated people. I also note that it tends to make otherwise good and honest people defend academic debauchery and dishonesty.
It’s as if claiming to be creationist hogs all the available RAM in their brains and forces a near-total synapse shutdown.
Cases in point: Creationists are scrambling to the defense of the mockumentary movie “Expelled!” in which Ben Stein trots out almost every creationist canard known to Hollywood in defending some of the greater misdeeds of the intelligent design hoaxers. Otherwise sane, good people, claiming to be Christian, make atrocious defenses of the movie.
I cannot make this up: Go see Mere Orthodoxy and Thinking Christian. Bad enough they defend the movie — but to defend it because, they claim, Darwin and Hitler were brothers in thought? Because evolution urges immoral behavior? I stepped in something over at Thinking Christian, and when I called it to the attention of Tom Gilson in the comments, he deleted the comment. (I’ve reposted, but I wager he’ll delete that one, too, while letting other comments of mine stand; he’s got no answer to any of my complaints.)
The stupid goes past 11, proudly, defiantly. The Constitution specifically protects the right of people to believe any fool claptrap they choose. These defenses of a silly movie come awfully close to abuse of the privilege.
Other useful things:
Update: Holy mother of ostriches! Tom Gilson at “Thinking Christian” has a nifty device that bans people from viewing his blog. Paranoia sticks its head into a whole new depth of sand! Here’s a truism: Creationists who like to claim Darwin was the cause of Stalin and Hitler, which is by itself an extremely insulting and repugnant claim, almost never fail to resort to Stalinist and Hitlerian tactics when their claims are questioned. Call it Darrell’s Law of Evolution History Revisionism.
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11 Comments | Accuracy, Bogus history, Charles Darwin, Darwin, Education, Ethics, Evolution, Free press, History Revisionism, Hoaxes, Holocaust, Intelligent Design, Junk science, Movies, Rampant stupidity, Religion, Science, Voodoo history, Voodoo science, War on Education, War on Science | Tagged: Ben Stein, Creationism, Entertainment, History Revisionism, Moral corruption, Movies, Rampant stupidity, Religion, Science | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
April 24, 2008
Good news: A subcommittee of the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Committee yesterday voted against letting the Institute for Creation Research award graduate degrees in science education because of their rejection of evolution. The full committee will vote today.
ICR promises to fight it.
Dallas Morning News reporter Terrence Stutz’s report is worth reading.
Citing the group’s teaching of creationism rather than evolution in its science curriculum, Dr. Paredes said it was clear the school would not adequately prepare its graduates to teach the scientific principles now required in Texas public schools.
“Evolution is such a fundamental principle of contemporary science it is hard to imagine how you could cover the various fields of science without giving it [evolution] the proper attention it deserves as a foundation of science,” he said.
“Religious belief is not science. Science and religious belief are surely reconcilable, but they are not the same thing.”
Henry Morris III, chief executive officer of the institute, contended that the school would prepare students to “understand both sides of the scientific perspective, although we do favor the creationist view.”
After the adverse vote from several coordinating board members meeting as a committee, Mr. Morris said the institute may revise its application or take its case to court.
“We will pursue due process,” he told the board. “We will no doubt see you in the future.”
Quiet and educational efforts from Texas Citizens for Science and the Texas Freedom Network probably helped turn the tide on this issue.
Resources:
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3 Comments | Creationism, Education, Higher education, Science, Texas, Texas Citizens for Science, Texas Freedom Network | Tagged: Creationism, Education, Higher education, Religion, Science, Texas | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
April 22, 2008
There’s a guy who doesn’t like my comments on his blog, so he’s banned me. Every once in a while I find a headline or link to something, and it takes me over there — and I remember why he doesn’t like my comments.
Rationality and accuracy are barriers to be overcome for some bloggers, and this guy often falls into that category. Today he’s bummed that gay students and their friends and relatives protest bullying of gays with a Day of Silence. Neil Simpson wrote:
The Day of Silence (where schools encourage kids to be completely silent for a day to protest alleged discrimination against gays) is back, and students’ rights are being violated left and right. It is bad enough that they disrupt the learning process for a whole day, but now some schools aren’t permitting students to miss school that day or instituting other requirements.
Okay, that’s enough. I gotta stop the quoting and make corrections. “Where schools encourage kids to be completely silent for a day?” There is no such place. This is a fabrication of someone. Who?
The link in the quoted paragraph goes to Kevin Bussey’s blog; from there we get a link to a story in WorldNet Daily, perhaps the single greatest source of information pollution on the internet.
But read the story — even WND doesn’t claim that schools are supporting the event. WND only decries the fact that schools won’t bully kids into not supporting the anti-bullying campaign (irony drips from every serif of this story . . .).
Gay clubs and the “Day of Silence” have no purpose in schools. The GLBTX propoganda machine just uses the Trojan Horse of being anti-bullying to get them in. It is all part of the drive not just for tolerance, not just for affirmation, but to silence all critics.
But why have sex clubs and school-sponsored protest days just for that? All you need is a simple and thoroughly enforced anti-bullying policy:
If you physically or verbally harass other students on or off school grounds you will have swift and serious consequences. It doesn’t matter if you are bullying because they are gay / straight / fat / thin / smart / dumb / pretty / ugly / etc., or if it is just because you are a mean jerk. Zero tolerance. Training over. Now go to class and learn something.
Bullying is wrong. I would always protect gays if they were being bullied, but that isn’t what this issue is really about. If it was, then the kids who are picked on for all those other reasons should get a special day as well, and schools wouldn’t persecute students who wanted to opt out of this special day.
Just a stand against bullying? Maybe Simpson will take a stand against bullying, you think? Maybe Simpson would urge his friends at the Texas State Board of Education to rejoin the National Association of State Boards of Education (NASBE). Texas pulled out a few months back, protesting the anti-bullying curriculum NASB had put together. The Texas officials — speaking for themselves, not necessarily the people of Texas, let me assure you — said they didn’t like the part that said “don’t bully gays.”
When stuff like that happens, people will on occasion use their First Amendment right to petition and right to assemble and freedom of speech to protest the stupidity. In the immediate case, the protest takes the form of remaining silent.
When gays and the friends of gays don’t speak, it makes the hardcore fundies crazy. The voices in their heads seem so much louder.
Nuts.
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8 Comments | Citizenship, Civil Rights, Education, First Amendment, Freedom of the Press, Politics, Public education, Rampant stupidity, Religion, Religious Freedom, Texas | Tagged: bullying, Christian hypocrisy, Day of Silence, Education, Freedom of Speech, Politics, Religion | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
April 22, 2008
A reader named Matt provided some incisive comments in another thread, “Cold showers for intelligent design: ID not even fringe research,” and I bring them to the top here to highlight a major failing of the intelligent design advocates, their complete absence from participation in origins of life research.
Matt blogs at Consanguinity, which recently featured an exchange on Ben Stein’s mockumentary, “Expelled!”
Matt took issue with a characterization that the intelligent design movement is not science. He wondered if they would get a fair hearing were they to submit their research to science journals. I pointed to the court records that show they would get a fair hearing, but that they do no research and so submit nothing for publication — which indicates the lack of science we were discussing. Matt suggested that Francis Crick and Frederick Hoyle were sympathetic to the ID cause, and I pointed out they both specifically refuted creationism and ID.
Our discussion is below the fold.
Read the rest of this entry »
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4 Comments | Accuracy, Biology, Charles Darwin, Creationism, Darwin, Evolution, History, Intelligent Design, Junk science, Movies, Politics, Religion, Research, Science, Texas, Voodoo science | Tagged: Andrew Ellington, Ben Stein, Creationism, Evolution, Expelled the movie, Intelligent Design, Origins of Life, Religion, Science | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
March 20, 2008
First the producers lied when they interviewed him for the film, claiming to be doing a different movie, a documentary. Then they refused to let him see anything that might reveal what of his own words they were using in the movie.
And now, the producers of Ben Stein’s great turkey of a movie, “Expelled!,” have booted the evolution teacher out of a viewing of the movie of which he is a star they promoted.
[Spew alert! Put the coffee/coke/beer down, and swallow before clicking on the link and reading the story linked to below.]
But having expelled the evolution teacher P. Z. Myers from the movie “Expelled!” and ironically making the point that the pretense of the movie only a pretense, the producer missed Dr. Myers much more famous guest.
Go, see, and laugh.
Buy the bumper sticker!
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7 Comments | A Good Story, Creationism, Evolution, Humor, Intelligent Design, Rampant stupidity | Tagged: Creationism, Evolution, Humor, Intelligent Design, Rampant stupidity, Religion, Richard Dawkins, Science | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
March 15, 2008
Freedom of Conscience Day?
James Madison’s birth day is March 16, Sunday. He was born in 1751, in Conway, King George County, Virginia.
Father of the Constitution, fourth President of the U.S., Great Collaborator, and life-long champion for religious freedom and freedom of speech, press and thought: How should we mark his birthday?
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9 Comments | 1787, Bill of Rights, Education, First Amendment, Free press, Free speech, Freedom - Political, Freedom of Information, Freedom of the Press, History, James Madison, Politics, U.S. Constitution | Tagged: Founder, History, James Madison, Politics, Religion | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
March 13, 2008
Or, why thinking carefully often outweighs shouting loudly in the free market of ideas. I stumbled across this entry, a serious question to a serious Buddhist practitioner.
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2 Comments | DDT, Environmental protection, Reason, Religion | Tagged: DDT, Environmental protection, Reason, Religion | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
February 16, 2008
So, if you check the comments over at Neil Simpson’s blog, somebody asked about the post Simpson deleted, and Simpson answered:
Didn’t read the thing? Heh. Figures. The comment reveals the depths of moral difficulty of the anti-Rachel Carson position — the position Simpson takes in the blog. Simpson can’t answer any of the criticisms. No, I didn’t change my e-mail address — Simpson’s blog was just more loving of correcting dissent than Simpson.
Personal attacks? Bullbleep. Simpson thinks any correction is “a personal attack.” If one is chronically in error about the facts, and chronically belligerent about dealing with data, one gets a lot of corrections.
Here’s a challenge to Simpson: This blog is open. I’ll edit out only your profanities if you use them. But I’ll wager you can’t defend your position. I won’t go Joe Stalin on you the way you did on me.
Neil, you’re in error about Carson’s book. You’re wrong. You have a Christian duty to fix the errors. Bet you won’t.
Marshall Art, if you’re interested, you can read the remarks Simpson won’t read, here. Now you know why, in my opinion, he’s afraid to read them. The comment isn’t even snarky, though heaven knows there’d be a right.
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7 Comments | Accuracy, Censorship, DDT, Ethics, Malaria, Point of personal privilege, Rachel Carson | Tagged: Accuracy, Ethics, Junk science, Malaria, Religion, Science | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
February 16, 2008
You know the syndrome: Someone is caught in a scandal relating to sex, and then they take an offer to pose nude for pornography, and end up merely as a naked embarrassment to everybody.
Same syndrome, but mercifully, without the nudism (yet): Creationists taking it just a bit too far. Two examples.
Example 1: Don McLeroy, newly appointed to the chair of the Texas State Board of Education, was embarrassed by the release of tapes of a talk he gave in a church, demonstrating for anyone who didn’t already know that he’s opposed to teaching science in biology, especially if that science involves evolution. Bad enough?
He’s posted a transcript of the tape on his own website. It almost appears he’s hoping for an appointment as a “fellow” of the Discovery Institute.
McLeroy may have posted the transcript to try to correct a statement the transcripts say he made: “”Remember keep chipping away at the objective empirical evidence.”
At McLeroy’s website, it’s listed like this: “Remember keep chipping away with the objective empirical evidence.” It’s a subtle difference, but it suggests McLeroy is ill-informed enough that he thinks there may be evidence to support creationism, rather than devious enough to urge the denial of reality. Bob, at Hot Dogs, Pretzels and Perplexing Questions, wrote:
I’m not quite sure what to make of all this. Was it a Freudian slip? Did he innocently misspeak? Or could it be that he edited the text after the fact? Either way, I don’t think it makes that much of a difference. They have no objective empirical evidence of their own to chip away with, just the objective empirical evidence they stubbornly attempt to chip away at, and to no avail. I’ll leave the discovery of any other discrepancies as an exercise for the reader, at least for now.
McLeroy shows no desire to appear neutral, as employees of TEA are now required to be toward science — or “neutered” toward science, as one might say.
Example 2: McLeroy’s Islamist partner, Adnan Oktar ( aka “Harun Yahya”), is a continuing embarrassment. This isn’t news, but I stumbled across the actual images he pirated — and they are impressive.
The Atlas of Creation purports to show that no evolution has occurred between a few fossil forms and modern forms of animals — therefore, Oktar concludes in his book, evolution could not have occurred at all. Oktar couldn’t sell the book, so he sent copies of the thing to school libraries across Europe, and then to selected people and school libraries across North America.
The book is beautifully printed and bound, with hundreds of full color plates — it must have cost a fortune to produce.
And so, Oktar had to make economies somewhere. He chose to plagiarize photos and not bother with lawyers to procure rights to print the photos. He also chose to abandon the use of fact checkers, it appears.
And so we get embarrassments, like Oktar comparing this caddis fly, below, to one caught in amber, and concluding there’s been no evolution. The problem, as you can plainly see from the photo I borrow from Forbidden Music, is that the “living” example is actually a fishing lure; Oktar has plagiarized a photograph of one of Graham Owen’s wonderul fishing lures.
Jesus urged his followers to become “fishers of men.” McLeroy and Oktar have confused such imprecations, horribly, with the hoax P. T. Barnum line, that there’s a sucker born every minute.
Owen’s lures are designed to fool fish. If McLeroy and Oktar have their way, Texas school children may end up as ignorant as the fish, and as easily fooled.
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213 Comments | Accuracy, Biology, Creationism, Plagiarism, Public education, Rampant stupidity, Religion, Science, Textbook Selection, War on Education | Tagged: Creationism, Don McLeroy, Evolution, Plagiarism, Religion, Science, Texas State Board of Education | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
February 16, 2008
Anti-science and anti-environment protection advocates appear to be ramping up their campaign to poison Africa with DDT. Whether it’s related to U.S. President George Bush’s last-gasp trip to Africa or something else, is difficult to determine.
The vicious campaign is popping up everywhere. Is there too much vitriol against sanity to be more than coincidence?
Religionist Neil Simpson’s poke in the eye of reason got me going this time. In “Dangerous environmentalism” he hits just about every false claim against environmentalists and every false claim for DDT in just a few paragraphs — he got it from Steve Forbes and repeated it without bothering to consider whether Forbes was engaging in ill-informed rant.
Steve Forbes doesn’t know much about the history, science or law of DDT or malaria, but that never stops him from opining that others are dead wrong in what they do know.
The rant hits so many of the favorite punching bags of the modern angry white male bigot: Intellectuals (those scientists and environmentalists with their college degrees), women and women’s rights (Rachel Carson didn’t marry, and fought her way to prominence in fields men dominated), history (they wish it weren’t so, and if they repeat what they want history to have been, maybe Santayana’s Ghost will leave them alone — not that they are ever bothered by repeating historical error), race (never miss a chance to accuse scientists, environmentalists, intellectuals and other “liberals” with race bigotry), foreign aid (see, we can just poison Africa back to health — if you’d just stop sending them money for bed nets and good medical care, DDT is all they need).
This is the money line from Forbes:
Yet in one of history’s more murderously myopic ongoing actions, most advanced countries and international agencies discourage its use. Why? Blame Rachel Carson’s seismically influential–and now largely discredited–book, Silent Spring, first published in 1962. In it she blames DDT for imperiling birds and people, portraying it as a blight of almost biblical proportions. It ain’t so. As Dr. Elizabeth Whelan of the American Council on Science & Health once put it, there “has never been a documented case of human illness or death in the U.S. as a result of the standard and accepted use of pesticides.” The British medical journal The Lancet similarly notes that after 40 years of research no significant health threat from DDT has been found.
Count the errors:
- The treaty that regulates the phase out of long-lasting, environmentally-damaging and human-killing poisons has a carve-out provision that specifically allows the use of DDT for limited indoor use (see Annex B); this treaty was negotiated at the end of the 20th century, eight years ago [1999 taking effect in 2001]. It represents the official position of “advanced countries and international agencies.” The treaty position is exactly the opposite of Forbes’ claim. How many years behind is Forbes in his reading? one might wonder.
- No one has ever discredited any significant part of Rachel Carson’s book, Silent Spring. Exactly contrary to Forbes’ claim, the book was found to be scientifically solid by a specially-appointed group of science advisors to President Kennedy, in 1963 [full text of “Use of Pesticides,” here]; it was found solid by later research by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, the U.S. Department of Agriculture, and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. Discover Magazine recently noted that there are more than 1,000 follow-up references since 1962 that verify Carson’s work.*
- Carson’s book accurately noted the damage to birds — not a single incident she recounts has ever been seriously questioned. The stories have been distorted and wild claims made against the distortions — but there is not a single study anywhere which contradicts Carson’s claims about damage to birds. Carson worried about human health effects, but stopped far short of saying DDT kills humans. Subsequent research has won DDT a listing as a probable human carcinogen by all of the world’s most respected and conservative health agencies, every single one.
- Elizabeth Whelan’s career is built on slamming scientists and science. But apart from the dubious provenance of the source, look at what Forbes quotes her as saying. Never a death in the U.S. as a result of using DDT in the limited way it’s now used in the U.S. There have been deaths outside the U.S. (and my recollection is at least one in the U.S.); and the methods that have prevented deaths are the banning of DDT for broadcast use, and extremely limited use at any time. She’s right: No deaths can be attributed to the non-use of DDT. She doesn’t say DDT isn’t a poison, or that it is not carcinogenic. She doesn’t account for deaths outside the U.S. She doesn’t get close to accounting for damage to wildlife and African food supplies from DDT. Half-truth to whole lie.
(It is often useful to remind critics that DDT was not banned because of dangers to human health, but instead because of its damage to beneficial animals outdoors. It’s also good to remind them that DDT was specifically reinserted into disease fighting by the EPA order in 1972 that banned DDT use on crops, only in the U.S.)
Then, with no sense for the irony, Simpson extols the virtues of mosquito netting.
Mosquito nets are another inexpensive solution. See Nothing But Nets if you want to help.
The Nothing But Net drive faces implicit opposition chiefly from interests who claim poisoning with DDT is a better idea.
One wishes critics of Rachel Carson would show a bit of Christian charity, calling for bed nets, but avoiding unjustified and misinformed calumny against Carson and environmentalists, who have labored intensively for 40 years to fight malaria.
One gets the idea it’s not malaria these pundits worry about.
A few words about totalitarianism below the fold.
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Spread the word; friends don't allow friends to repeat history.
88 Comments | Accuracy, DDT, Environmental protection, Junk science, Malaria, Rachel Carson, Religion, Science | Tagged: DDT, Malaria, Neil Simpson's unreason, Rachel Carson, Religion, Science | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
February 13, 2008
The Waco Tribune published an opinion piece three weeks ago that I should have noted earlier. Trib columnist John Young noted that creationism isn’t science, and that generally creationists are not friends of science education (or any other education, sadly, not even Bible education).
Conditions surrounding Texas science standards, and education standards in general, have deteriorated very rapidly, with the chairman of the State Board of Education going on the warpath against mathematics, English and science teaching. For quick destruction to get the foolishness out of the way, one might hope he’ll go on the warpath against football and cheerleading. I’ve not had time to pass along all the sad details.
But then, not all crazies are stupid.
Earlier:
Spread the word; friends don't allow friends to repeat history.
111 Comments | Creationism, Education, Education quality, Evolution, TEKS, Texas | Tagged: Creationism, Education, Politics, Religion, Science | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
February 12, 2008
Rereading the Gettysburg Address and the Cooper Union speech of Lincoln, I wondered for a few moments whether there are others with similar gifts for words who might be on film or tape. It got me thinking about the vast gulf between religion on the one hand, and faith and justice on the other hand.
Then I got a notice of a link from this post about Barbara Jordan, at Firedoglake.
It’s a nice collection of links, a Barbara Jordan tribute all bundled up ready to unwrap. Sometimes truth does go marching on.
Who since Jordan?
(Thanks to Phoenix Woman at Firedoglake for the post, and for the link here.)
The Cooper Union speech of Lincoln was 148 years ago, on February 27.
Spread the word; friends don't allow friends to repeat history.
4 Comments | Abraham Lincoln, Accuracy, DBQ sources, Famous quotes, Fly your flag today, Freedom - Political, Great Speeches, Heroes, Historic documents, History, History audio sources, History video sources, Justice, Reason, Religion | Tagged: Barbara Jordan, Black history, Great Speeches, Heroes, Justice, Religion | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
February 11, 2008
It was easy to miss it in most Texas churches yesterday, but it was Evolution Sunday. Darwin’s birthday, February 12, comes this week.
Dallas Morning News columnist Steve Blow offered an explanation that deserves reading outside of Dallas. I think he’s a little optimistic, saying “hundreds” of preachers participate — in Texas? Really?
Blow writes:
“Evolution Sunday offers an opportunity to educate our congregations that science is a gift,” said the Rev. Timothy McLemore, senior pastor at Kessler Park United Methodist Church in Oak Cliff.
“If we believe God is truth, we don’t need to shrink from truth in whatever way it presents itself. We don’t have to be threatened.”
The State Board of Education is set to review and revise science curriculum standards in Texas. And Dr. McLemore said he is “deeply concerned” about attempts to inject religion-based “intelligent design” theories into science classes.
“It seems profoundly unhealthy,” he said. “Do we really want the government deciding what religious beliefs and viewpoints are taught in school? It’s our job to promote our understanding of faith, not the government’s job.”
Even in Texas. We can hope government officials in Texas are listening.
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Spread the word; friends don't allow friends to repeat history.
Leave a Comment » | Charles Darwin, Creationism, Evolution, Religion, Science, Separation of church and state, Texas, Texas Citizens for Science, Texas Freedom Network | Tagged: Education, Evolution, Politics, Religion, Science | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell
Millard Fillmore's Bathtub 
Hey, wasn’t there some environmentalist’s post here earlier? Someone defending Carson’s position? What happened?
That might have been the comment I deleted. I didn’t read the whole thing. The guy must have changed his email address, because my filter usually blocks him. He was the first guy I ever had to block for repeated inane arguments and personal attacks. I gave him a lot of chances but in the end he was just not worth the time to discuss anything with.