Threats to Science
by MikeGeneI plan on periodically blogging about the animal rights movement. Yet how does this fit within a blog devoted to things related to ID and teleology? That's simple "“ many critics of ID have made the fit for us.
One of their most common complaints about ID is that it represents a "threat to science." Yet anytime something is labeled as a threat, we usually have a perception of reality that is built upon extrapolation. One must therefore ask whether the perception is an example of tunnel vision (extreme versions are known as phobias). If one spends most of their time focusing on a perceived threat, to the exclusion of the rest of reality, the perception can begin to blur into a hallucination. For example, consider people who are hyper-focused on debates about the 2nd amendment and guns (or some other pet issue). If you know any, you know they tend to think their debate is of central importance and they can't understand why more people don't get worked up about a debate on guns. Is it because the rest of the people are blind to the crushing importance of the issue? Or might the act of hyper-focusing artificially inflate the sense of importance for any issue?
Thus, by factoring in the activity of the animal rights movement, we can help to perceive the ID movement in its larger sociological context. Where, on the scale of "threats to science," does it truly rank? Each person must decide for himself, but to make a decent decision, plenty of information comes in handy.
I have already drawn attention to the fact that the animal rights movement has prevented the construction of new research facilities in Richard Dawkins' back yard.
In fact, the new Chancellor of Oxford University warned that some anti-vivisectionists were threatening fundamental principles of liberal democracy.
So let's move on to some more recent developments.
Hereis a brief summary of the way in which the animal rights movement has been attacking science. According to this article, "Animal research labs have been targeted at the University of Minnesota; the University of California, San Francisco; Western Washington University; and Louisiana State University. And last month in Washington, John Lewis, the FBI's deputy assistant director for counterterrorism, told a Senate committee that animal- rights and environmental activists resorting to arson and explosives are the nation's top domestic terrorism threat." Also note that scientists are being targeted:
"Let this message be clear to all who victimize the innocent: We're watching. And by axe, drill, or crowbar - we're coming through your door. Stop or be stopped," the ALF Web site warned before going on to list the home addresses of the Iowa scientists who experiment on animals.
This article quotes the vice president for research at the University of Minnesota as saying:
"The hardest thing is people see this and don't want to go into science," he said. "Why would they go into science when they can have their work threatened like that?"
The movement is also opening a new museum next door to research facilities:
Bogle likened the museum to a Holocaust memorial. He said it will serve as a permanent protest against the cruelties scientists impose on primates. "It won't end until we turn all these buildings into museums to what used to be," he told the crowd.
And UW is targeted with more protests against research.
PETA has a scientist who will be part of their own wedge strategy to put a halt to animal experimentation, although PETA kills animals.
PETA, which is only one of many animal rights groups trying to put an end to research that involves animals, has an annual budget of 16 million dollars. Compare this to the ca. 1 million dollar budget the Discovery Institute devotes for its ID-related activities.
July 8th, 2005 at 10:38 am
Animal rights activists at least have a valid point. Science has done some horrific things to animals in the past in the name of research and these things, have painted it with the use of animals to this day. Of course, do you do research on animals Mike Gene? Are you aware of the ethical and similar requirements that are required? Additionally, the anmal rights movement, like the intelligent design movement, has its strongholds. The sort of opposition you have named is really prevalent in England, partly because it's the birth place of the anti-vivisectionist movement and their very first defeat as well (a gaff in a trial ironically ended their ability to stop all animal testing).
Where I am, there is almost no such extremist opposition to animal research. Nutball groups in the US and England are the primary motivators but everyone knows that despite their threats, they will never be able to stop animal research because court decisions struck them down a long time ago. Ultimately, there are uses of animals that are borderline even know, do you agree with lobotomising a rat and then putting in electrodes into the brain to deliberately stimulate certain regions? Some that are perfectly necessary, such as common immunology/microbiology uses of rats and mice, where these animals are experimentally infected with pathogens then killed to extract lymphocytes to analyse immune responses to them?
Both of these are routine today and both can be argued on their merits to if they are ethical or not. What colours a lot of animal rights opposition is the use of animals that people associate best with, namely dogs, cats and rabbits. Additionally, as I pointed out, many of these groups have legitimate points against animal research especially due to the gross uses of primates in psychology- brutal experiments that I'm not going to bother describing as they were nothing short of inhumane. Anyone who wants to understand, even emphasise with these people should look up what was done.
And again, I come from someone who works with experimental animals and has direct experience in this area.
PETA are, ultimately just completely crazy and are not widely liked nor supported. Of course, it's interesting that you've tried to make out that anti-IDists have a 'pet' obsession with ID as a big threat to science while 'ignoring' other aspects. Well actually, I'm particularly interested in the anti-GE lobby and have often engaged in debate with the anti-GE lobby here in New Zealand. I see the anti-GE lobby as a large threat to good science because they miseducate the public on basic facts about the technology. They move around and destroy research crops and threaten scientists. In many respects, they are the 'real' analogy for me between the animal rights movement so prevalent in England.
I spend much more time arguing with this lot than I do the IDists, but I do that in the forums where it counts (in New Zealand) because that is a 'real' threat that I can see. ID is largely American. At the same time, I regard these groups as a threat not just because they are crazy extremists, that is something the law will deal with, but because they attempt to miseducate the public. They miseducate the public in how research is carried out, they manipulate facts and shamelessly lie. Like any form of anti-science nonsense and particularly they directly target Children with gross distortions of truth (see Greenpeace books on GE aimed at kids, with golden gems that frog DNA if inserted into a banana will turn the banana into a frog/banana hybrid).
Another lobby I spend a lot of time arguing against is the abstinence only (no sexual education though) lobbies and those sort of groups. Another group is the anti-vaccination lobby which again, also has a presense here in New Zealand. I again, spend a great deal of effort arguing with these people. How about I look at these groups and compare them with ID (why don't you?). Anti-vaccination lobbiests attempt to miseducate the public, they don't directly threaten scientists or force the shutting down of labs however. Yet, I take a considerable interest in them and so do a large amount of other individuals. They present a threat to public education and if unopposed could potentially be a threat to public health- just not immediately.
Should I ignore them Mike and focus on 'immediate' threats as a priority? I don't think that would be a good idea because it's only after they've made ground that any problems become apparent.
So why do I regard ID as a threat then bearing in mind you're rather correct that ID proponents do not try to cease research in evolution. You're also correct that unlike the animal rights/anti-GE movement IDists do not try to shut down labs or similar. Now that I think of it, neither does the anti-vaccination lobby, the HIV denial lobby, or the lobby that doesn't want to have sexual education taught in schools but abstinence only. Gee Mike, I should cease my opposition immediately to one form of anti-science simply because it doesn't have instant ramifications on anything! Brilliant logic! You've successfully proved the anti-vaccination, HIV denial and sex-ed lobbies are perfectly fine because they are not whacky extremists on the far end of a scale like PETA.
I regard ID as a threat simply because they use similar tactics. Going through courts, misinforming the public and attempting to subvert education. These are tactics common to all pseudoscience movements Mike, they aren't unique. The difference is that ID doesn't go as far as the extremists who are usually extremely left wing and believe that vandalism, threats against scientists are legitimate forms of getting their way. Again, why don't you make a distinction between the psychology of the majority left 'animal rights' and 'anti-GE environmentalists' that make up the ones that destroy labs and burn crops? The ID movement, anti-vaccine, anti-sexual education (or abstinence only) groups for but three examples are either more right wing (Christian religious groups) or more either or (you can find 'naturalist' nuts in the anti-vaccine group, who are very definitely left wing).
In your persecution complex (common of creationists too) you regard opposition to ID as being absurd because there are other threats to science from extremist nutters. I disagree, I think opposition to ID and the tactics they employ needs to be actively criticised and shown up for what it is. The threat that ID proposes to the public in terms of the misinformation and miseducation campaigns (slowly been dismantled and all major media outlets see through the facade, like CNN) is just as much as any other pseudoscientific group. There is no 'threat' level Mike, it's all the same and all of it warrants the opposition from the scientific community.
I tend to put my efforts into the anti-genetic engineering and anti-vaccination groups. Others have different preferences but they represent what I see more often than other things. ID just turns up for me because it's so prevalent among the internet forums that I visit and it nearly always turns up in the creationism threads (hence, where my interest came from).
But again, and I want to cover an underlying point that through all this you remain blissfully oblivious too: Many scientists can sympathsise with the basic ideals of animal rights activists. Maybe you don't understand this point because you don't work with experimental animals yourself, but it's not something that I enjoy when I'm dissecting something I knew was a living animal that I've seen grow and associated with for several months. I also concede the gross and cruel use of animals in the past by science, which many of these people are afraid of.
I also understand that we (as scientists) have caused this opposition ourselves and given groups like PETA ammunition. We refuse to make public the uses of animals, leaving many in the public to swear we are hiding something behind our doors that is reminiscent of the hideous experiments done even a mere 50 years ago. As scientists we fail to properly educate the public in how we undergo research with animals and because of this the public falls to miseducation from the likes of PETA easily. This is exactly the phenomena seen in the anti-GE lobby and I will refer you to one of the most blatantly ridiculous anti-GE books:
Everything you need to know about GE… but the government won't tell you. Charles Drace. Raven Press. Christchurch New Zealand.
Ultimately my point is you've set yourself up and argued against a wonderful strawman, but I don't buy it. I regard anything that attempts to miseducate the public, which if you follow ID enough you can certainly see they do and promote an agenda (no matter what it is, religious or otherwise) as an equal threat. All of it deserves to be answered.
Your primary mistake and why this is a completely irrelevant strawman, is that really, most of us who argue against ID (and be aware, I'm talking about 'teach the controversy' ID here) also do argue against most other forms of pseudoscience/anti-science as well, often more vigourously. 'Teach the controversy' ID isn't held on a pedestal as 'the threat' because there will be different opinions on that, but it is 'a' threat.
Comment by Aegeri — July 8, 2005 @ 10:38 am
July 8th, 2005 at 11:21 am
Aegeri,
Thanks for providing more examples of other threats to science. I agree with a lot of things you raised, but in some places, you are off base.
For example:
You are arguing against a strawman, as nowhere do I suggest that you cease your opposition to ID.
Again, nowhere do I regard opposition to ID as being absurd.
You mistakenly perceive a strawman because, for some reason, you think I am arguing that all opposition to ID should be stopped.
This seems to be true in your case, and I respect that. But you are not really in a position to speak for most of the critics of ID.
Comment by MikeGene — July 8, 2005 @ 11:21 am
July 8th, 2005 at 11:51 am
Oh before I begin, you are being spam botted by some annoying 'buy some loans' and such forth crap in some of the comments.
There are actually more than that as well if you can believe that. For example, here in New Zealand we have people that are positively allergic to any form of nuclear anything. Some are so crazy, when the concept of allowing American ships to visit again was bought up, they threatened to blow them up (they retracted this when it was explained to them what that could do, but you know…) to prevent them. All the while we're stuck in an energy crisis and it's starting to get considerably worse.
Anyway, I need not bore you with the nutters from my country.
This is however the impression I get from this essay and the last one you posted however!
Ahhh but again, this is the impression you are giving me by picking the most off the wall example you could. It would be like arguing about gun control of conventional firearms by pointing out North Korea has nuclear weapons.
But again, this is the impression I am deriving from this and your previous essay. Remember that you were the one who wondered why Dawkins didn't write an anti-animal rights essay after all.
Like, who spent an incredibly large amount of time on the mercury-autism link and who is also a critic of ID? Again, one of the points of my essay is that many scientists tend to argue against what they see more prominently. I argue with anti-GE lobbyists, because New Zealand is rife with them but many other scientists don't bother. Why not? Because such resistance is non-existant in America. Many of the ID critics are American? Why? Because ID is most prevalent in America (virtually dead everywhere else). Many of the more notable critics of the animal rights movement are from Britain, where they have the most nutty militant groups such as the Royal Society for the Protection of Animals (RSPA).
Again, you've just mischaracterised the majority of ID critics and what they do and don't oppose. For the most part, I've seen that most ID critics (Pandas thumb crowd, PZ Meyers and others) tend to also criticise other forms of pseudoscience as well like anti-vaccination.
One thing I will state is to be a critic of ID, anti-vaccination and the like is amazingly more difficult than a proponent. You need to make much larger and detailed replies to adequately refute simpler statements (that make sense on their own, but don't when all the information is present, but that is why they inherently work). Consider this response to Jonathan Wells at the PT, http://www.pandasthumb.org/pt-.... Two silly statements takes a lot more to respond to.
One of the responses I wrote against anti-vaccination proponents took nearly 2 pages to respond to one paragraph. One of my lecturers wrote a nearly 3 odd page rebuttal to the local newspaper refuting a mere six points made by anti-MeNZB proponents. The point here is it is massively time consuming for anyone to engage in any sort of refutation without saying "NO U" or similar sillyness. Add onto this lab work, writing progress reports and studying/preparing for teaching labs and suddenly the time is right down. If I could, I'd spend all my time battling various groups but I have to pick and choose- it's simply too much effort to argue against everyone :/
Note, I certainly do agree with you that there are anti-ID proponents who do nothing but argue against ID. They generally tend to fit the atheist sort of mentality where they want to reject any concept at all that agrees with a God(s) or the supernatural in general. They are not however, the majority of anti-IDists and you'll find that many ID critics are opposed to anti-science but may have chosen to pick their battles.
Comment by Aegeri — July 8, 2005 @ 11:51 am
July 8th, 2005 at 8:11 pm
Aegeri,
Yes, those were your impressions rather than observations. Our impressions are more than the things we observe. They also involve how our minds interpret what we observe. And in this case, your interpretation, thus impression, was wrong. I actually encourage you to oppose ID all you want. If there is any truth to ID, it can only help in the long run.
You write:
I've not seen this, but then I don't follow their blogs closely (although I have cyber-debated with many of these people over the last few years). Perhaps you can provide some evidence. For example, when the University of Iowa's Spence Laboratories was trashed last November, who among these critics blogged about it? If that is too specific, why not simply give us a rough breakdown of their criticisms "“ take a guess and estimate what % of their blogs are devoted to the various threats to science.
Comment by MikeGene — July 8, 2005 @ 8:11 pm
July 9th, 2005 at 1:42 am
I've not seen this, but then I don't follow their blogs closely (although I have cyber-debated with many of these people over the last few years). Perhaps you can provide some evidence.
Orac, linked earlier, is highly critical of ID and has wrote several essays on the subject. He's also blogged at length on the anti-vaccine groups, holocaust denial, pseudoscientific treatments like chelation and more. You can go to his blog and look on the left hand side for links to many of the things he has regularly blogged about:
As an example.
On my blog, I've spent around 6 posts to ID, 6 to AIDS/STDs (abstinence) and 3 to the anti-vaccine movement (possibly 4). My blog wasn't around last november, but I would certainly have criticised the laboratory trashing, in the same way I had a go at the anti-GE movements trashing of experimental crops (letter to a student newspaper around 2 years ago).
PZ Meyers at Pharyngula often posts about ID and is one of the main contributors to the Pandas Thumb (which is specifically about refuting creationism and ID). He tends to post about ID/creationism a fair amount, but he also talks about other things surrounding science such as the court case surrounding Kennewick man (Lawsuit about allowing scientific investigation)
, opposition to stem cell research from the American administration (Stem cells) and another entry discussing a rebuttal of Michael Crichtons anti-climate change book (Climate of fear rebuttal).
Additionally, is this what you were discussing?
Sounds like a condemnation to me.
I think I have resoundingly proved my point, noting that you can certainly describe PZ Meyers as one of the most 'active' ID critics (many posts on his blog are dedicated to it) and there it is, the incident you've described being criticised on his blog. I think there is sufficient evidence to state, given myself, Orac and PZ Meyers (representing a scale as well, with Orac being the least prominent ID critic, I'd be in between as I post several places on ID and PZ Meyers being a mainstream prominent one) all talking about different issues.
You are clearly making a gross and demonstratably incorrect generalisaton.
Of the blogs I go to, some are very heavily into criticising ID like Pandas Thumb, but that would be like accusing a political blog about American politics for being inadequate for not criticising New Zealand politics. It would be on an extreme end. PZ Meyers would have a higher majority of posts directly corresponding to ID/creationism than other forms of anti-science but he does still mention these (as above links demonstrate). He's particularly keen on right wing anti-science, whereas I am more interested in left-wing anti-science (GE protestors for example as I noted above).
I would be in the middle, the majority of my posts are not on ID (less than 50%) and my main pet peeve has been with anti-vaccinations and sexually transmitted disease miseducation campaigns.
Orac would be on the opposite sale, having far less posts on ID/creationism but more on medical pseudoscience and quakery, such as anti-vaccine, chelation therapists and such forth.
ID critics clearly are not just critics of ID, but generally to most anti-science movements.
Comment by Aegeri — July 9, 2005 @ 1:42 am
July 9th, 2005 at 1:51 am
Things went a little horrible, but I'd also like to add this quote from PZ Meyers:
Also he's raised a brilliant point about PETA too. Many animal rights activists DO target psychology labs over others as a priority. Again, as I said in my first post they do so for a distinct reason:
When people see pictures of a monkey that has had its brain case removed and an electrode inserted through into its cerebral cortex, that provokes a very angry reaction.
Case in point: A satire show called Eating Media Lunch showed a piece where the host became a new middle eastern terrorist (yes, it's done for absurdity). At the end of the show it switched to 'him' being blown apart by an Apache helicopters main cannon, which was real footage taken from the Iraqi war (basically, some soldier being turned into a cloud of dust, not pretty and would have been worse if it hadn't been a nightvision camera).
In the same program they showed that sportka commercial with the cat being decapitated by the sunroof.
Complaints about watching a man being blown apart by a helicopter: Zero.
Complaints about watching a cat being decapitated by a car with obviously fake editing: Two thousand, five hundred and twenty one.
Comment by Aegeri — July 9, 2005 @ 1:51 am
July 9th, 2005 at 9:04 am
I'm not sure what you are talking about. This tangent we are in was spawned when you asserted, "most of us who argue against ID (and be aware, I'm talking about "˜teach the controversy' ID here) also do argue against most other forms of pseudoscience/anti-science as well, often more vigourously." I pointed out that while this may be true for you, you should not generalize your own approach to that of most ID critics.
Your response was that you have seen most ID critics also criticize other forms of pseudoscience, citing the PT crew, pz, and others. I told you that I had not seen this, admitting that I don't follow the blogs closely, and asked for examples.
As for the PR crowd, you replied:
Well, you brought them up. They clearly are more obsessed with ID and do not (contrary to your original claim) argue "often more vigourously" against other forms of pseudoscience/antiscience.
As for pz: "PZ Meyers would have a higher majority of posts directly corresponding to ID/creationism than other forms of anti-science but he does still mention these (as above links demonstrate)."
Yes, he is clearly more obsessed with ID and does not ) argue "often more vigourously" against other forms of pseudoscience/antiscience. His most frequent and vigorous arguments are with ID.
As for the "others," you cite Orac, "who having far less posts on ID/creationism but more on medical pseudoscience and quakery, such as anti-vaccine, chelation therapists and such forth." In other words, many people would not think of him as an "ID critic" as he does not spend a lot of time criticizing ID.
So we are back where we began this tangent "“ you shouldn't extrapolate your own even-handed approach as an umbrella for all your fellow critics. You need to remember that when I speak of ID critics, I speak as someone who has much experience arguing with 100s of them.
Nevertheless, all of this is a tangent, as I did not and am not trying to make the point that ID critics only criticize ID. The point of my blog stems from the "threat to science" label and how any threat must be seen in its larger sociological context. The main point to my blog is captured in these two sentences:
Comment by MikeGene — July 9, 2005 @ 9:04 am
July 9th, 2005 at 10:52 am
And I provided several examples after about 3 minutes tops of searching to prove my point that they do take an interest in arguing against other forms of pseudoscience. In fact I even found the exact incident you were asking for.
Seems this is more of a retreat
Because the blog is about it. Perhaps you should go to real climate and ask them why they don't argue against animal rights activists on their blog. This is because, as I pointed out (but wanted to make clear) the pandas thumb was set up to argue specifically against ID/creationism. Naturally, the people there are going to do so and hence do so.
After 5 minutes of searching not only did I find several examples of him taking on other things than ID, I also found the exact thing you complained you had 'not seen' ID critics write about (the attacks on laboratories for example).
Now either you're making a bait and switch or you should concede the original point. It didn't take me very long to find it and this really is relatively irrelevant. The point I have made is that they do argue against other forms of pseudoscience and certainly take note in it. I picked PZ Meyers because he has his own blog (some others don't) and I picked Orac because of the general theme of his blog.
The fact of the matter is you are now claiming he is "clearly more obsessed with ID and does not argue "often more vigourously" against other forms" when in reality I've demonstratably proved that assertion wrong. Again, you are not familiar with what PZ Meyers has written and yet are claiming to know exactly what he has argued against?
Very curious that.
Now the bait and switch comes in! You claim that critics of ID must spend a large amount of time criticising ID to be a critic. Then you accuse critics of ID for spending a large amount of time criticising ID.
This is plainly the most ridiculous logic I've heard in a while, because he very clearly has spent effort debunking various ID claims:
Firstly
Secondly
The fact of the matter is, I know him not as any critic but a general pseudoscience critic. Now again, I've never denied that people can lean more towards one form of pseudoscience over another, but I've merely established that ID critics can and do argue against other forms, including animal rights activist vandalism.
Again, the fact I was able to quickly find that one of the more prominent ID critics PZ Meyers had done exactly what you were asking for: He condemned the animal rights activists attacks on the laboratories. It disproves your entire contention. The fact you've never gone hunting for these peoples opinions on other things makes me wonder how you've managed to come to this conclusion in the first place.
But again, have a look at the site opposing the denial of human induced climate change. Should they argue against animal rights as voiciferously as they do against the American administrations position on climate change? What about anti-vaccine? How about ID?
Actually I do more against anti-GE/anti-vaccine and have a clear bias in that respect. I do it though more formally in my own country where I see the immediate threat. However, when I speak of anti-GE lobbiests, I know for a fact I'm not describing just anti-GE lobbiests I've learnt a massive lesson from dealing with these people: They are multiple types in one. Anti-GE lobbiests are often anti-vaccination (Greens) or something else similar. Anti-vaccination cranks always go hand in hand with alternative therapist cranks. Sometimes the difference between various 'threats' is just what the individual is saying at the time.
The ID theorists that everyone argues against primarily, present problems in basic education (IE teach the non-existant controversy) and anything that miseducates students is definitely not useful. It leads to reduced understanding of what are essential processes in things like the biotechnological industry such as the nature of mutations, horizontal gene transfer and other processes.
For example, if generating more efficient enzymes is impossible due to 'improbabilites of forming new binding sites etc' according to Behe and company, why is it that genome shuffling is an amazingly successful technique rapidly improving an enzymes function and utility? This is a random rearrangement with no real logic on the scientists part except to do it lots under a selection criteria: ID that maintains things like developing new protein sites is next to impossible is just talking nonsense (and they DO argue this sort of thing).
Anything that threatens education should and definitely is a threat of as great as anything else. That you take the most extreme of the extreme nutballs, which are actually comparatively rare but make their presense felt more easily (we are talking about nutballs here!) is being slightly too extreme. Teach the controversy ID, like any other form of miseducation mission (see Leonards lesson plan for example) has ramifications only much later down the road and generally limited to American science only.
Again, I doubt that techniques like genome shuffling, which is simply random splatting of different genes together in the hope you get better results would have came out of students confused that random mutations can even do anything meaninful. See the link about Johnathan Wells does it again, he doesn't even think mutations are involved in cancer: this ISN'T the sort of people you want influencing education criteria! They pose an economic threat to Americas ability to lead in biological sciences. Anti-vaccinists public health. Anti-GE proponents are more similar to the ID movement in that they pose an economic threat more than anything else etc.
Comment by Aegeri — July 9, 2005 @ 10:52 am
July 9th, 2005 at 4:04 pm
Aegeri,
I think I know what the problem is. Just as you had false impressions about the point I was making elsewhere, I think I was laboring under a false impression of this point:
I was under the impression that you were trying to paint the community of ID critics as people who are simply opposed to all forms of pseudoscience, where ID and creationism merely get their fair share of the criticism. From you responses, I now understand that your point is that there are a few critics of ID who do spread their criticism around and that even some of the hardcore critics will criticize another form of pseudoscience once in a while. I have no problem with that claim.
I never said they didn't. It would not surprise me if for every few dozen anti-ID articles, some ID critics will also write a criticism of some other form of pseudoscience. Even PZ (who you brought up) was able to throw a couple of sentences together about the Iowa lab destruction. BTW, if a few creationsts trashed an evolution lab and threatened evolutionary scientists with axes, do you think pz might be able to muster more than a couple of sentences? I suspect he'd be condemning it for the rest of his life.
Okay, since this tangent was built around my false impression of the point you were trying to make, we can leave this all behind.
If we now turn our attention to the "threat of ID", you write:
ID is not taught in the schools. Thus, are you under the impression most American high school students have a good understanding of "the nature of mutations, horizontal gene transfer and other processes?" As for the biotechnological industry, do you think they hire a lot of lab people with only a high school diploma? Anyway, unless most high school students are being taught ID, I don't see much reason to worry about much of this. I'd be more worried about the current status of schools and why so many are currently do such a bad job in a variety of subjects. It would seem we should be more concerned about what's presently going wrong than what could possibly go wrong in the future.
As I said in another blog, I'm focused on the actual results, not potential results. The nutballs are doing real-world harm to science. They have succeeded in intimidating two major universities to abandon their plans to build new research centers. Those new centers, which would have been doing science, do not exist. And there are several labs whose data have been destroyed. Scientists are being threatened and some people are opting out of science because of the threats. The animal rights movement is a global movement that is much better funded and orchestrated that the ID movement. Even the FBI considers it the "nation's top domestic terrorism threat."
Comment by MikeGene — July 9, 2005 @ 4:04 pm