Clueless in Wales

I say follow the money. I'd bet he got paid in some way to say this BS.

No, I dont think he got paid. After all, he is has a Ph.D. and is well published in his field. His employers would have demanded from him to do a better job. He did it for nothing, in an attack of hubris, because he felt he was clever, very clever, much cleverer than all those biologists.

"After all, he is has a Ph.D. and is well published in his field."

lol. that doesn't mean he wouldn't have accepted payment to do this.

"His employers would have demanded from him to do a better job"

er, you mean like Dembski?

all they need to do is "tow the party line"; they don't need to say anything actually intelligent to jump on the "Intelligent" Design bandwagon.

There may be no "missing links" in the fossil record, but there are a hell of a lot of found links.

But, because he has a PhD & is a FRHS, you can bet that Creationists will cite this as an authoritative source. After all, he says exactly what they want to hear.

Ah, I'll have to change my newsreader later and move the Social Affairs Unit blog from 'Politics / Rightwing' to 'Wacky Creationist Idiots'. On behalf of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, I apologise for this scientifically illiterate idiot. Only a few weeks ago, another bit of creationist idiocy went on in the British media: The Spectator published an article by Paul Johnson. It seems that conservative and right wing media outlets in the UK are slowly accepting creationist and IDist material for publication. Which is a shame since I always quite liked The Spectator.

If anyone needed to be reminded of the old adage, 'Cobbler, stick to your last', it's this guy.

I judge antiscience claptrap by how often I must stand up and walk outside for a short reality break while reading. I abandonded Rubinstein on my third visit to the front yard having barely read past a few pages. What is most odd is how did he gather such a list of conventional creationist "challenges" without bothering to have read any science?

I can only recommend that Prof. Rubinstein doesn't sit too still for too long. He runs the risk of being buried as he is already brain dead.

After a quick beer, I finished reading. I had been nearly done. But still, 4 short breaks and a beer just to read that? Maybe I have become too sensitive to the absence of fact and reason. I thought that frequent exposure would have desensitized me by now.

Doesn't Paul Johnson always write for The Spectator?

Paul Johnson has always been a nutcase. He's not called "Loonybins" for nothing, you know.

I'll be damned. They've put up a slew of critical comments on the SAU blog, including the one I submitted. In fact, what I thought was a vitriolic comment that I submitted is among the tamer there! I gotta work on that, I guess.

RBH

Actually, it looks to me like the SAU is the usual echo chamber that one gets in UK politics. The fact that there are at least 25 times more comments on this topic than on any of the others there suggests that is the case. So, thanks for all you posting, but this is likely just a small UK outbreak that didnt need jumped on by everyone. But its fun to watch. ;)

On behalf of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, I apologise for this scientifically illiterate idiot.

Given the various IDiocies in the U.S. -- in Pennsylvania and Kansas and elsewhere -- y'all have nothing to apologize for. :)

RBH

SteveF: Yes, but in a recent edition he had an article whining about the oppression of Christian intellectuals by 'Darwinian fundamentalists' (far too rational, they show up the religious fundamentalists - I mean, you don't find people standing in tube stations holding a leather bound Origin of Species preaching that you should accept your monkey heritage or else you'll be sent to Kansas). As a libertarian kind who likes to keep up on the goings-ons in the Tory party, I occasionally pick up the Spectator. The last thing I expected was the words 'Darwinian fundamentalism' to be used. I have since stopped buying the magazine as part of my "cut any financial links with creationists" campaign (I only read - and scoff at - creationist books that are second hand or in the library - there's no way I'm going to be paying Bill Dembski's mortgage or buying another damn dinosaur model for Hovind or Ken Ham's theme park).

I'm glad to see that bookshops, while making the initial error of putting Dembski and friends in Evolution have slowly moved them back in to General Science, then Philosophy. It's only a short leap now to get them back to Theology where they truly deserve a place.

"I mean, you don't find people standing in tube stations holding a leather bound Origin of Species preaching that you should accept your monkey heritage or else you'll be sent to Kansas."

ROFLMAO!

damnit, why not? that would be frickin hilarious to do! dress up in a monk costume and become an "origin-thumper".

Judging by the content of the essay, "desultory" is an overstatement. "Non-existent" is more accurate.

Ok, the traffic on the SAU seems to have died down.

There seem to me to be two outstanding questions- "Why has the dear professor not had the balls to respond? and "Why don't we pound him for a second round?"

i saw one response over there that suggested the good professor had no idea the kettle of fish he stirred up, based on some emails between the two.

I'ts possible he is trying to keep a low profile. Though, he really should consider retracting his statement at some point.

"why the hysteria of the reaction" You must be in Europe. An unholy alliance has formed in th US between the political right and the Southern Baptist fundamentalists with creationism to be inserted in school curricula as a trade off for political support. Their latest ploy is to claim there is an alternative "scientific" theory to evolutioary biology, "Intelligent Design" (Google search this if you have time to waste). Mainstream biologists have been caught leaden-footed in the propaganda war and sometimes now can over-react. What infuriates them most is the allegation made by creationists that there is a scientific basis to ID that deserves being taught in state schools. Professor Rubinstein seems to have entered this controversy unwittingly, or so a brief email exchange would suggest. Posted by: Alan Fox at May 16, 2005 08:27 PM

Here in Europe, ID is almost unheard of, as there are few Southern Baptist fundamentalists to promote it. It is possible that Professor Rubinstein genuinely was unaware of the controversy in the USA. I only heard about ID a few weeks ago after using the word Darwin in a post on a forum about English as a 2nd language and being trolled by someone urging me to see the light by reading the works of Dembski and Behe.It did not have the desired result as I find muself now addicted to Panda's Thumb, especially your pet monkey. I did email Professor Rubinstein suggesting he should check out Panda's Thumb and, when replying, he remarked that his previous article in SAU suggesting abolition of income tax only generated three replies, remarking "it shows you what gets under people's skin". We're so smug over here. Only in America...

Anyone interested in taking up Bill Rubinstein's challenge? See
http://www.socialaffairsunit.org.uk/blog/archives/000427.php

and scroll to the end.

Secondly, I would be happy to donate say one hundred dollars or fifty pounds to charity if, by the end of ten years from now (May 2015) anyone can produce an example of evolution in the animal world which has occurred during that time span - that is, the appearance of a new species of animal, which does not exist today, but which is descended from an existing species. (Of course this must occur in the natural world - laboratory experiments are excluded). I readily admit that ten years is a ridiculously short period, but there are more than one million species of animal life and new species should be appearing all the time, surely. I would stipulate a much longer time frame - fifty or five hundred years - but won't be around to monitor the results.

"I mean, you don't find people standing in tube stations holding a leather bound Origin of Species preaching that you should accept your monkey heritage or else you'll be sent to Kansas."

I can imagine a crazy-eyed evolutionist running up to me in a crowded street, book in hand, and saying in a breathlessly fanatical tone, "Have you found the missing link? Here, take these pamphlets."

A J. Bowen has commented on this piece, with little more knowledge than that displayed by Rubinstein in his original. By the time I got to read it, both Orac of Respectful Insolence and PZ Myers on Pharyngula had already dissected it, leaving me little to say but "Right on, guys!"

RBH