Okay, the editor said it: “there is no apolitical science.” We are not now dealing in the world of accusations but of admissions. He is admitting that opposition to “creationism,” however they define it is political. Fine. We all knew that but we did not have it in writing before. Getting things put in writing is a genuine help.
Culture
Rob Sheldon on Scientific American’s foray into politics, backing Joe Biden
I was a devoted SciAm fan growing up. I collected other people’s old copies and had a collection going back to the 60’s. Then SciAm was bought out by some big publishing firm. And my favorite column, the Amateur Scientist by Forrest M. Mims III , was cancelled because Mims was a Christian.
Scientific American breaks with 175-year tradition, endorses Joe Biden for US President
They can break with tradition in this way if they want, of course. But then they will no longer be able to say that their science is not tainted with (drenched in?) politics. Which is why, no matter what the crisis, no one did it in the past. The outcome, no matter who wins the U.S. election, will be reduced public trust in science. Scientific American could well find itself down there with “media” generally, in terms of public trust.
Will respect for science survive the polarization of our era?
Alternatively, it may become possible to have a discussion about what, exactly, science is. For example, in the case of the ATP turbine, “Natural selection did it” has the same explicit explanatory value as “God did it.” But natural selection is somehow science and God is not. Why? How?
A fond remembrance of the 2005 book, “On Bullsh*t”
Gunderman: As discourse moves from television to Twitter, it can be further degraded into mere flamboyance. What matters is no longer speaking the truth but simply attracting and holding attention. Getting it right gives way to getting noticed.
At Medium: On the “Impending cancellation of Darwin”
Essentially, Noah Carl is forcing the biology establishment to admit that they can’t impugn Darwin for his racism because he’s their religion. All those other guys can just be trashed. But not Darwin. Not for anything.
Flap over use of term “intelligent design” in PNAS paper
It’s possible that what Phillips means by “positive Darwinian selection” is random selection that looks a lot like design. The sin is in actually using words that imply that that IS what it looks like. Just when it looks like they’ve hammered everything into submission, another bulge appears.
The smog is beginning to clear around hydroxychloroquine
Revealing the way politics has invaded science all the way down, according to Norman Doidge. There’s a good chance that, even though most people don’t directly say it, the reputation of “science” will never recover from this episode. People will disbelieve politely but thoroughly.
Where Wallace can shed light and Darwin can’t
From ENST: … how did humans by means of natural selection alone develop language and sophisticated verbal communication? The answer: we didn’t. It was a product inherent in us, what Alfred Russel Wallace, Darwin’s partner and challenger, said it was all along, an intrinsic part of human exceptionalism.
Britain’s Natural History Museum is feeling the heat over Darwin’s racism
Some of us remember fifteen years ago when anyone who brought up Darwin’s racism was informed, superciliously, by Darwinists that only a creationist would raise such an issue, as if there were nothing to be appalled by. One is tempted to say, suck it up. But that’s not a solution.
Why the space aliens have never shown up? Seven reasons offered
4. It makes the most sense for the aliens to have become artificial intelligences, say many theorists,
Darwin’s influence on Chinese Communism
The author seems to have trouble comprehending the millions of victims of totalitarian rule in China as any kind of a problem. But Darwinism does that to people.
John West: Science and scientism in the Age of COVID
David Klinghoffer: As Dr. West explains, for all the blessings of science, there are problems with saying, as some literally have done, “In Fauci we trust.”
In the past twenty years, how has the landscape changed for ID?
Much has changed. Certainly, Darwinism certainly isn’t the hot stuff it was. Heck, even Darwinian racism is coming to be seen as a problem. So it’s clearly no longer protected by pixie dust.
One secret of Darwinian just-so stories is boundless imagination
David Coppedge: Nothing is ever settled in Darwinian history. That’s part of the genius of Darwin’s strategy for secular science: it provided job security for storytellers. Since human imagination is boundless, Darwin put it to work overcoming the challenges of empirical proof.