The other day, I took Pat Hayes of Red State Rabble to task for his revisionist use of history. Hayes claimed that back when ID critics were protesting the showing of the film "Privileged Planet" at the Smithsonian, the Discovery Institute was "howling". As it turned out, if anyone was doing the howling, it was ID critics, with hyperbolic rhetoric about the Smithsonian being prostitutes and James Randi willing to pay 20,000 dollars just to stop the showing of the film.

In a new post, Hayes replies, having marshalled a number of quotes from ID blogs, ostensibly showing that it was the ID supporters who were "howling like a scalded dog." But it's hard to see just how Hayes' examples support his claims. Take the first of his quotes, from the blog "Evolution News & Views":

It will be interesting to see how the story [the film's screening, RSR] is covered given the hysterical tone in evidence on certain ultra-Darwinian blogs in recent days.

First of all, the description of the reaction from ID critics is certainly correct: Saying things like "this is how science might have been done under the Taliban" is hysterical. Does Hayes disagree?

Now, I'm not sure what the term "ultra-Darwinian" means, but it seems to me to be a long way from "howling". Lots of people put pejorative and inaccurate labels on those they disagree with. For example, Francis Collins is a theistic evolutionist and director of the Human Genome Project. Yet when biologist PZ Myers watched an interview, in which Collins spoke about how man is a special creature, Myers labelled him a "creationist dupe". Surely, Myers must have been howling over the intellectual licking he got from Collins' interview, right?

Another of Hayes' quotes is from Denyse O'Leary, who originally broke the story on the Smithsonian showing "The Privileged Planet":

I call the outraged Darwinists "Darwinbots" because I'll bet that most of them have never seen The Privileged Planet or considered grappling with the questions it raises about design and purpose in the universe.

O'Leary's guess that most of the critics of the film had never seen it seems reasonable. Consider the New York Times' headline for the story, "Smithsonian to Screen a Movie That Makes a Case Against Evolution". This despite the fact that the film didn't discuss evolution at all. As for the "Darwinbots", this looks like another one of those pejorative labels I talked about earlier.

In what is probably the most puzzling of Hayes' examples, he tries to portray me as one of the "scalded dogs", which, if true, would make it doubly embarassing to be me:

"¦after experiencing a barrage of letters from ID critics and an attempt from James Randi to make them look like prostitutes, the Smithsonian has suddenly discovered that "the content of the film is not consistent with the mission of the Smithsonian Institution's scientific research."

Hayes has bolded the word "prostitutes", as if my mere usage of that word means that I'm in excruciating pain, having been scalded by the boiling hot water of rationality. But let's take a look at what some of the ID critics were saying:

I think it [Randi's attempt to stop the showing of the film] sends the message that the Baird Auditorium is for rent to the highest bidder, nothing more, and that undercuts the DI's claim that the Smithsonian has granted them some measure of legitimacy.

The Smithsonian is acting like a whore, anyone can rent her services. And for cheap, only 16,000 dollars.

I'm reminded of the cheap Scotsman joke"“Why does a Scotsman play the porno DVD backward? Because it shows the whore giving the money back to the john.

Yup, lots of scalded dogs running around in the street.

PS. Hayes seems to be annoyed that he doesn't know "the identity of the person hiding behind your pseudonym". Well, I have chosen to use a pseudonym, as that allows my arguments to stand for themselves, without the influence of whatever authority I may have or lack. My arguments should be evaluated equally, whether I'm a professor of biology or a bouncer at a night club. I think my choice is understood by people like Nick Matzke of the National Center for Science Education or Liz Craig of the Kansas Citizens for Science, both of whom have used pseudonyms when criticizing intelligent design.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, September 19th, 2006 at 5:47 pm and is filed under The Critics. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site. The trackback link is: http://telicthoughts.com/responding-to-red-state-rabble/trackback/