My last post elicited some extremely interesting responses. As a reminder, we are considering the following two strings of text, the first of which resulted from haphazard banging on a keyboard and the second of which is the first 12 lines of Hamlet’s soliloquy: #1: OipaFJPSDIOVJN;XDLVMK:DOIFHw;ZD VZX;Vxsd;ijdgiojadoidfaf;asdfj;asdj[ije888 Sdf;dj;Zsjvo;ai;divn;vkn;dfasdo;gfijSd;fiojsa dfviojasdgviojao’gijSd’gvijsdsd;ja;dfksdasd XKLZVsda2398R3495687OipaFJPSDIOVJN ;XDLVMK:DOIFHw;ZDVZX;Vxsd;ijdgiojadoi Sdf;dj;Zsjvo;ai;divn;vkn;dfasdo;gfijSd;fiojsadfvi ojasdgviojao’gijSd’gvijssdv.kasd994834234908u XKLZVsda2398R34956873ACKLVJD;asdkjad Sd;fjwepuJWEPFIhfasd;asdjf;asdfj;adfjasd;ifj ;asdjaiojaijeriJADOAJSD;FLVJASD;FJASDF; DOAD;ADFJAdkdkas;489468503-202395ui34 #2: To be, or not to be, that is the question— Whether ’tis Nobler in the mind to suffer The Slings and Arrows of outrageous Fortune, Or to take Arms against a Sea of troubles, And by opposing, end them? To die, to sleep— No more; and by a sleep, to say we end The Heart-ache, and the thousand Natural shocks That Flesh Read More ›

Jerry Coyne has written a post in which he states that he is inclined to believe that Jesus never existed, although he hasn’t made up his mind yet. And on what does Coyne base his tentative opinion? An article in the Huffington Post by a biopsychologist named Nigel Barber, a self-published book by a systems engineer, Michael Paulkovich, which Coyne admits he hasn’t read, and finally, another book which he hasn’t read, written by atheist activist Richard Carrier, who has a Ph.D. in ancient history, but who (judging from his Wikipedia biography) has no teaching or research position at any accredited institution. [Update: according to his C.V., Carrier teaches classes at the Center for Inquiry Institute Online (a think tank Read More ›

PZ Myers has written a post in which he reprimands Dr. Neil deGrasse Tyson for failing to acknowledge that he falsely quoted former President George Bush in some talks he gave. I wonder if Professor Myers will publicly apologize for attributing a false quote to equity feminist Christina Hoff Sommers in a recent post he wrote on September 16, 2014, in which he accused Dr. Sommers (pictured above), who is currently employed by the American Enterprise Institute, of being “a professional selective quote-miner and anecdote-citer who is on a mission from AEI to discredit all of feminism” and “a contrarian beloved by anti-feminists … with a reputation for dishonesty and twisting the facts.” For good measure, he added that “she’s Read More ›

Mark Frank writes in a comment to a prior post: When reconstructing an evolutionary past I would say that scientists are doing two things which correspond to my Bayesian analysis: They are proposing explanations that 1) might well have happened – the prior probability is acceptable 2) would have a good chance of producing what we observe – the likelihood is acceptable When reconstructing a biological past I would say that ID scientists are doing two things which correspond to Mark Frank’s Bayesian analysis: They are proposing explanations that 1) might well have happened – the prior probability is acceptable 2) would have a good chance of producing what we observe – the likelihood is acceptable Mark Frank, do you Read More ›

In recent days Jeffrey Shallit and I have been discussing the differences between a random string of text and a designed string of text. I put the two strings up in this post; Shallit responded in this post; I responded to Shallit in this post; and Shallit replied here. After all of this back and forth, the one question that remains is the question in the title to this post. Has Jeffrey Shallit’s fundamentalism driving him barking mad? To remind readers, here are the two strings: #1:OipaFJPSDIOVJN;XDLVMK:DOIFHw;ZDVZX;Vxsd;ijdgiojadoidfaf;asdfj;asdj[ije888Sdf;dj;Zsjvo;ai;divn;vkn;dfasdo;gfijSd;fiojsadfviojasdgviojao’gijSd’gvijsdsd;ja;dfksdasdXKLZVsda2398R3495687OipaFJPSDIOVJN;XDLVMK:DOIFHw;ZDVZX;Vxsd;ijdgiojadoiSdf;dj;Zsjvo;ai;divn;vkn;dfasdo;gfijSd;fiojsadfviojasdgviojao’gijSd’gvijssdv.kasd994834234908uXKLZVsda2398R34956873ACKLVJD;asdkjadSd;fjwepuJWEPFIhfasd;asdjf;asdfj;adfjasd;ifj;asdjaiojaijeriJADOAJSD;FLVJASD;FJASDF;DOAD;ADFJAdkdkas;489468503-202395ui34 #2:To be, or not to be, that is the question—Whether ’tis Nobler in the mind to sufferThe Slings and Arrows of outrageous Fortune,Or to take Arms against a Sea of troubles,And by opposing, Read More ›