A clear sign that people are losing an argument (at least as they themselves have framed it) is when they do what Darwinist Pigliucci and others are doing, as per Bill’s recent post.
Here are a few moves that guarantee a loss of public support, and the Darwinists seem to be doing them all:
– attribute enormous power and influence to those who doubt. (Speaking for myself, I was a completely obscure trade mag hack and textbook editor (though a reliable and accurate one) until I began to wonder whether the whole of the history of life can be explained by natural selection acting on random mutations and whether that Brit toff Darwin was really the greatest man in history. Now, all sorts of people have an opinion about me who aren’t even sure of my age, sex, or nationality.
Nice going, eh? Except, in all honesty, I didn’t really do anything except start asking of Darwinism the type of questions I used to ask about automotive airbags or social service programs.
– squawk that it is all a big conspiracy (oh, you know, the Wedge and Wedge II and – my favourite – Wedge the Edge!, after which, I guess, the sky falls, or something – I’d have to go look up which part of the Apocalypse happens after that).
As any journalist knows, most people can’t keep a secret for five minutes if they can gain temporary social importance by communicating it. We j’s depend on that. It’s called gossip, right? Gossip has the same effect on conspiracies as soap has on bacteria.
So any time someone tries to tell me that a broad social change or pattern is the result of a conspiracy, I know I am dealing with either a desperately naive individual or a less than firmly rational one. Or else a person who manipulates these types for his or her own ends.
What is happening to Darwinism today is the same thing that happens to failing enterprises throughout history. Read More ›