Creationism

Further to johnnyb’s “Intelligent Design Creationism” as a Label”: The word salad “cdesign proponentsists” was cited as evidence of something  in comments 4 and 40. For readers confused by “cdesign proponentsists’” here’s the widely circulated story from an atheist blog at Patheos: Pandas, it turns out, went through several editions: in its first (1983) edition, it was titled Creation Biology, then renamed in 1986 to Biology and Creation, then renamed again in 1987 to Biology and Origins, finally becoming Of Pandas and People. The plaintiffs subpoenaed the book’s publisher, the Foundation for Thought and Ethics, to obtain these prior drafts, and found something amazing. The earlier drafts, as you might expect from the titles, made repeated references to creationism. But Read More ›

One minute apologist: What is the difference between ID and creationism? Bobby Conway interviews Jonathan McLatchie on the difference between ID and Creationism. Thoughts? Would it make a difference to design detection if there were no religious texts as at all? What if they had all disappeared in a barbarian onslaught (as much classical literature did during the Dark Ages)? Would we ask the same questions? Follow UD News at Twitter!

It’s not news that there is a persistent (and widely promoted) perception that Intelligent Design is little more than Creationism in a cheap tuxedo suit, an attempt to dress up a Christo-fascist, right-wing, theocratic agenda as though it were legitimate science, fraudulently stealing the prestige of science. (For people who believe this, science . . . in Richard Lewontin’s tellingly self-refuting phrase . . . is as a rule viewed as “the only begetter of truth.”  [NB: this is a philosophical claim about accessing truth and warranting it, not a scientific one; so, such scientism falsifies itself and tends to cause self-reinforcing confusion and polarisation.]) So pernicious is this insinuation or allegation, that if we are to clear and de-polarise Read More ›

It is worth pausing to pull up more from the rich motherlode of the Kuran-Sunstein Stanford law review article on opinion and reputation cascades, to help us understand what has been going on: >> the probability assessments we make as individuals are frequently based on the ease with which we can think of relevant examples.‘ Our principal claim here is that this heuristic interacts with identifiable social mechanisms to generate availability cascades—social cascades, or simply cascades, through which expressed perceptions trigger chains of individual responses that make these perceptions appear increasingly plausible through their rising availability in public discourse. Availability cascades may be accompanied by counter-mechanisms that keep perceptions consistent with the relevant facts. Under certain circumstances, however, they generate Read More ›

It has become apparent that a major objection by EL et al, is that ” . . . What undermines the “case for design” chiefly, is that there isn’t a case for a designer” — clearly implying God as Designer/ Creator. This objection is closely backed by the now far too common atheistical/ secularist notion that belief in God (especially the God of the Bible) is utterly irrational and therefore a menace to the community. As we continue this for record* response series — 1st, 2nd, so far . . .  —  we need to address this objection. Not, because design theory is “Creationism in a cheap tuxedo” [a canard that should long since have been apologised for by those Read More ›

From the BBC: The Albertan, who has a longstanding interest in fossils, was digging a basement for a new home in Calgar… One is tempted to wonder whether the government-funded Beeb hack has any idea what digging out a basement in Calgary might even mean. Aren’t we all eating pineapples now, instead of sweeping up our underground furnace rooms? Whatever. Meanwhile, “No, it hasn’t changed my mind. We all have the same evidence, and it’s just a matter of how you interpret it,” he told the paper. “There’s no dates stamped on these things.” But Dr Zelenitsky – while she might disagree about fossil dating – praised Mr Nernberg for his awareness of what the fossils were. “Most people would Read More ›

Is there a new term we could use that would make more sense? John Harnett writes Science has become the new religion. Those who dare challenge the dictates of ‘science’ are often declared crackpots, pseudo-scientists or just plain crazy. If you deny or doubt evolution, or anthropogenic global warming (AGW), now called ‘climate change’, or the effectiveness or safety of certain vaccines, or the universal safety of genetically modified foods, as compared with natural breeding and hybridization practices, you are called nasty names. These might include ‘flat-earther’, particularly if you deny Darwinian evolution. It has come to a point now that to be called a ‘creationist’ is a big negative, like you are a pseudo-scientist, or follower of astrology, or Read More ›

For decades, the creationist movement was primarily situated in the United States. Then, in the 1970s, American creationists found their ideas welcomed abroad, first in Australia and New Zealand, then in Korea, India, South Africa, Brazil, and elsewhere—including Europe, where creationism plays an expanding role in public debates about science policy and school curricula. In this, the first comprehensive history of creationism in Europe, leading historians, philosophers, and scientists narrate the rise of—and response to—scientific creationism, creation science, intelligent design, and organized antievolutionism in countries and religions throughout Europe. Providing a unique map of creationism in Europe, the authors chart the surprising history of creationist activities and strategies there. Over the past forty years, creationism has spread swiftly among European Read More ›