Posted by Gerry L on September 11, 2007 8:50 PM

As both a librarian and a library patron, I struggle with the dilemma of checking out creationist/ID books. I certainly don't want to spend my money on them, but it can be useful to read them. And once I've checked one out, should I renew it again and again to keep it off the shelf and away from innocent eyes? Or would doing so increase the "circ stats" on the title and perhaps prompt the collection development people to acquire another copy?

What should we do without the critics to prevent us from dangerous information?

Placement of ID books within a science section also diminishes the amount of truly scientific books that can be displayed in any one science section, and thus limits the public's access to scientific knowledge.

And following that logic, assuming there is no physical law of the universe that proscribes the limits of science sections vis a vis other sections, every other book in the other sections of the library has the same effect of limiting the public's access to scientific knowledge. So, moving ID books elsewhere doesn'treally help.

Now while I don't mind saying that I have always had a certain fondness for The Cat in the Hat, and Green Eggs and Ham, I can now see that I was a victim of a well-funded PR campaign. It is now clear that the Cat in the Hat was a ringleader in the War on Science.

Dr Seuss, SHAME ON YOU!!!!!!

Gotta run off to bed. I'll sleep well knowing the Book Cops are on patrol.

Of course who would expect consistency from the idiots suggesting this sort of thing ?

"Do they have a complete definition of science that is accepted by all?"

They're using the Kitzmiller decision. Because, you know, whenever a judge rules on something, we should update all libraries accordingly.

Placement of ID books within a science section presupposes that ID is itself a science, and thus lends scientific credibility to a supernatural explanation of the world.

Data/observations always underdetermine the hypothesis, so what's the big deal? Regardless if that hypothesis has supernatural or natural assumptions.
They're sounding like positivists. However, no logical connection exists between the data and the hypothesis.
You try to shoehorn science into a mold like that and you in turn cause it to lose its power. Substructures of the universe can't be directly observed - and since explanation of natural phenomena typically requires the utilitization of the theoretical entities (the assumption that our beliefs of these substructures are close to what they are in reality) many positivists in turn stated that science wasn't an explanatory discipline, that its main purpose was to describe.

Do they have a complete definition of science that is accepted by all?