David Klinghoffer wrote, Protest David Coppedge's Persecution, Direct to NASA! Quoting:

From all appearances, supervisors at NASA's JPL abused their power in order to persecute Coppedge, a top computer specialist on the Cassini Mission to Saturn and a Darwin doubter. NASA's involvement means the affair is not like the recent Martin Gaskell case at the University of Kentucky which, in terms of generating taxpayer anger, stood to stir up residents of Kentucky in particular since they were paying for the whole thing. Here, with NASA being the federal space agency, every American has a direct stake in the matter.

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In my never-ending angst in choosing between Mike Behe and Mike Gene, I came across PZ Myers' thread, Evolve a Car, which links to here.

Will this help me sort it all out?

Comments section has been closed down due to completely irrelevant discussion.

The case study continues…

In part 1 we discussed how the partisan mind creates an alternate reality by bypassing the rational lobe of the brain. We saw how the partisan brain deals with information which challenges the subject's deeply held partisan beliefs.

Now let's see how the partisan brain processes information which reinforces the subject's deeply held partisan beliefs.

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From the abstract:

"Religiously unaffiliated subjects had significantly more lifetime suicide attempts and more first-degree relatives who committed suicide than subjects who endorsed a religious affiliation."

PDS, who has commented at Telic Thoughts in the not too distant past, wrote Martin Gaskell Wins Settlement of $125,000 from U. of Kentucky, at his blog. PDS quotes an ACLJ source:

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Though my religious friends complained that it was unfair to our beliefs, I thought Bill Maher's movie, "Religulous" was (except for his preachy ending) good-natured ribbing, and I enjoyed it immensely. Likewise, I find Ricky Gervais's pokes at our beliefs to be equally good-natured, and I feel sure that I would very much like him in person.

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Scientist PZ Myers says that something called "The Mediocrity Principle" is "essential" and "fundamental" to science.

What is "The Mediocrity Principle"?

"The mediocrity principle simply states that you aren't special."

And why is that "essential" to science?

"What the mediocrity principle tells us is that our state is not the product of intent, that the universe lacks both malice and benevolence, but that everything does follow rules — and that grasping those rules should be the goal of science."

And what can "The Mediocrity Principle" teach us?

"The universe does not revolve around you, this planet isn't privileged in any unique way, your country is not the perfect product of divine destiny, your existence isn't the product of directed, intentional fate, and that tuna sandwich you had for lunch was not plotting to give you indigestion."

Really? Because those bacteria sure acted like they knew exactly what they were doing!

"Everything that you as a human being consider cosmically important is an accident."

My kids are cosmically important. I'm fairly certain they weren't accidental.

"If humans had gone extinct 100,000 years ago, the world would go on turning, life would go on thriving, and some other species would be prospering in our place — and most likely not by following the same intelligence-driven technological path we did."

Really? Why not, since we are just "mediocre"?

"Most of what happens in the world is just a consequence of natural, universal laws"

Only "most"? You mean there are some things which defy the mediocrity principle?

"Opposition to the mediocrity principle is one of the major linchpins of religion and creationism and jingoism and failed social policies."

Wow! This Mediocrity Principle is not only essential for science, but for good foreign policy and social planning too? Is there anything that it can't do?!?

"There are a lot of cognitive ills that would be neatly wrapped up and easily disposed of if only everyone understood this one simple idea."

So religion is a "cognitive ill" that can be "neatly wrapped up and disposed of" with The Mediocrity Principle. It's now clear that PZ is really trying to tell us that metaphysics (his poorly thought out metaphysics, that is) is "essential" and "fundamental" to science.

Sorry, Professor Myers. The Mediocrity Principle isn't essential to science. It's only essential to your particular brand of scientism.

Tom Gilson posted Benjamin Wiker’s *Moral Darwinism: How We Became Hedonists* at Thinking Christian. The post is a book review of Moral Darwinism: How We Became Hedonists. Tom Gilson on Epicurean materialism:

The Western world’s moral battles are not just differences of preference or opinion. They are the result of living in different worlds entirely. One of those worlds is built on an unsupported and unsupportable set of faith statements about the nature of reality, concocted not from evidence but in support of a particular moral view, which is in turn closely associated with what is believed to be our condition after death. It is a view that extends far back into antiquity but remains enormously influential in spite of modern-day scientific findings to the contrary.

The rival world, the one that is forever at odds with the one just described, is that of the Christian theist.

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At last, Behe's second reply to Coyne, Even More From Jerry Coyne, which is a reply to Coyne's New Genes Arise Quickly.

A 1951 football game between Princeton and Dartmouth featured the great Dick Kazmaier. Princeton's Kazmaier was an All-American and a Heisman Trophy candidate (he would win the Heisman later that year with a record number of votes). Talented and handsome, he had just been featured on the cover of Time Magazine. He was a beloved idol, and the most celebrated player at the very school where American College Football was born.

It was a rough game. Lots of penalties on both sides. Kazmaier was sidelined early with a broken nose and a concussion. Princeton's Brad Glass was kicked in the ribs while laying on the turf. The second half saw Dartmouth's Gene Howard taken out with a leg injury, while Dartmouth QB Jim Miller was stretchered off with a broken leg. News stories about the game were notably acrimonious on both sides.

In 1954, a study published in The Journal of Abnormal Psychology asked Princeton and Dartmouth students about their perceptions of the controversial game.

In short, Princeton students overwhelmingly (93%) saw the game as "rough and dirty" . Not a single respondant thought the game was "clean and fair", and nearly 90% thought Dartmouth initiated the rough play. After viewing the game on film, Princeton students said that Dartmouth had committed twice as many penalties as Dartmouth students saw, and those penalties were more flagrant than Dartmouth students said.

Dartmouth students were shown the same game, but came away with very different conclusions. More than half thought both sides were to blame for the rough play, and were nearly evenly divided on whether the game was "rough and dirty" or "rough and fair". 13% said the game was clean and fair, and most saw the penalty infractions as even between the two teams.

In the conclusion of the study, the authors wrote:

"…it is inaccurate and misleading to say that different people have different "attitudes" concerning the same "thing." For the "thing" simply is not the same for different people whether the "thing" is a football game, a presidential candidate, Communism, or spinach."

It is true that deeply partisan beliefs color our perceptions. Not just in our attitudes, but in the way our brain chemistry helps us perceive reality. When confronted with information that threatens our partisan beliefs, our brains divert processing and bloodflow from areas of the brain associated with "cold reasoning" to areas of the brain known to process social emotions. In other words, when our deeply held politics are threatened, we respond emotionally, and not rationally.

Enter PZ Myers.

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Father of the U.S. Constitution and Bill of Rights

For those of you who may not have seen or may not remember the movie, Castaway, Tom Hanks' character is marooned on an island for four years, trapped by the high waves that constantly break against the shore.

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I previously wrote that I suspected that Michael Behe hadn't posted his second response to Coyne because he realized what a challenge it would be. I've since found out that isn't the reason. It's the holidays, so we should expect his reply some time next week.

Sorry about that, Professor Behe.

On Wednesday, February 9, 2011 at 7:00 PM, Sean Carroll will deliver a lecture titled Remarkable Creatures: Epic Adventures in the Origin of Species at the Janelia Farm Research Campus Auditorium. The address is: 19700 Helix Drive, Ashburn, VA 20147.

His "Dialogues of Discovery" lecture will detail the search for the origins of species and describe some of great adventures that have occurred in that quest over the last 200 years. Carroll will chronicle the exploits of a group of explorers who walked where no one had walked, saw what no one had seen, and thought what no one else had thought.

Casey Luskin authored Pro-Intelligent Design Peer Reviewed Scientific Paper Argues for an "Engineered World" at Evolution News and Views. He states that "a pro-intelligent design peer-reviewed scientific paper has been published in the International Journal of Design & Nature and Ecodynamics by Dominic Halsmer." The title of the paper is: The Coherence of an Engineered World. Luskin states that "one reason the authors feel the universe is engineered is the fact that it is mathematically and scientifically comprehensible." This is not a novel viewpoint but merits review.

Atheists and some naturalists posit a "just is" alternative to the remarkable comprehensibility perspective. Whether due to the luck of a dice roll or an inexplicable predictability resulting from a universe birthing process, comprehensibility is seen as not particularly noteworthy by that faction. One of the problems with that view though is the absence of a base line by which remarkableness can be assessed. The birth of a universe, being the unique process it is, could also forever hide whatever physical causes gave rise to it. Is this particular outcome one in a million, one in a billion or simply an expected and likely outcome of whatever causal factors preceded it? How would we know? Does this come down to metaphysics in the end or is physics able to produce decisive data?
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