You know, it's been so long since I've heard someone spew nonsense about evolution (it was last night when I watched the Michael Shermer vs. Kent Hovind debate on YouTube) that I was so happy that I wouldn't have to go a single day without it! Thanks again to Ann Coulter for entertaining us yet again with her wisdom about the "liberal religion" of evolution. It wasn't enough that her book Godless: The Church of Liberalism spent, by her own reckoning, a third of its time "debunking" evolution. No, since Rick Perry decided to tell us that Texas teaches creationism AND evolution (it doesn't, not legally anyway) and was immediately mocked, Coulter took up her pen of idiocy to enlighten the masses about evolution.
First, Ann rants on World Net Daily (where else but that hotbed of anti-science thinking?) that evolution is the "flash mob" method of science in which it is "belief" not evidence that matters. Read the article in full if you must, but frankly she presents the same old arguments that scientists from Dawkins to Prothero to Ken Miller have refuted over and over again. She touts the "mathmatical impossibility" that all "30-40 parts of the bacterial flagellum) could have evolved at once, citing Michael Behe's book Darwin's Black Box. Well of course no scientists posit that they arose at the same time. As Ken Miller points out repeatedly in his excellent book Only a Theory, evolution builds on the parts of the supposedly "irreducibly complex" feature that already exist, and that what today is a flagellum was once used for something else. But this knowledge doesn't stop Coulter, who laughably believes that with "microscopes" we've discovered many complex inner parts of a cell. She thinks that "evolution fanatics" would rather not be asked to explain these mechanisms.
But the problem, Ann, is that we have. Repeatedly. To you, to Behe and to the entire world in books, blogs, lectures, etc. The argument of irreducible complexity, nothing more than Paley's Watchmaker analogy revisited, have been shown to be flawed and false. Behe was even in court for the 2005 Dover Intelligent Design trial when this was shown to be the case. Yet, just like every other creationist, even when their objections have been answered, they keep on using them as though you never told them a thing.
Her second column about evolution touted the missing fossils argument, pointing to a supposed lack of transition between pre-Cambrian and Cambrian fossils. This too is false, as PZ Myers is quick to point out. For Ann Coulter, I would recommend she read something that wasn't written by Behe, whose own department at Lehigh University issued a statement supporting evolution and condemning Intelligent Design as not scientific, publically distancing themselves from Behe. Coulter should start with Miller's Only a Theory, go on and read Prothero's Why Evolution is True, and, just for fun, she should read Richard Dawkins' book The Greatest Show on Earth, for the simple fact that she referred to him as "retarded."
I would have more respect for the Young Earth Creationists and Intelligent Design proponents if they just came out and said, "We believe in Young Earth Creationism because we believe in a literal Genesis and no evidence will convince us otherwise." All the protestations about "gaps in the fossil record", "irreducible complexity" and "teach flaws in the theory of evolution" all really boil down to that. They should at least be honest about their position and stop donning the mask of science.
Thanks to the public statements of both Rick Perry and Michele Bachmann, both in support of Intelligent Design in the classrooms, we can say with some certainty that evolution is going to be a subject during the election cycle. Given that, we can look to hear more of Coulter's moronic assertions about evolution. I'll be looking forward to it, frankly, because I can always use a good laugh.
First, Ann rants on World Net Daily (where else but that hotbed of anti-science thinking?) that evolution is the "flash mob" method of science in which it is "belief" not evidence that matters. Read the article in full if you must, but frankly she presents the same old arguments that scientists from Dawkins to Prothero to Ken Miller have refuted over and over again. She touts the "mathmatical impossibility" that all "30-40 parts of the bacterial flagellum) could have evolved at once, citing Michael Behe's book Darwin's Black Box. Well of course no scientists posit that they arose at the same time. As Ken Miller points out repeatedly in his excellent book Only a Theory, evolution builds on the parts of the supposedly "irreducibly complex" feature that already exist, and that what today is a flagellum was once used for something else. But this knowledge doesn't stop Coulter, who laughably believes that with "microscopes" we've discovered many complex inner parts of a cell. She thinks that "evolution fanatics" would rather not be asked to explain these mechanisms.
But the problem, Ann, is that we have. Repeatedly. To you, to Behe and to the entire world in books, blogs, lectures, etc. The argument of irreducible complexity, nothing more than Paley's Watchmaker analogy revisited, have been shown to be flawed and false. Behe was even in court for the 2005 Dover Intelligent Design trial when this was shown to be the case. Yet, just like every other creationist, even when their objections have been answered, they keep on using them as though you never told them a thing.
Her second column about evolution touted the missing fossils argument, pointing to a supposed lack of transition between pre-Cambrian and Cambrian fossils. This too is false, as PZ Myers is quick to point out. For Ann Coulter, I would recommend she read something that wasn't written by Behe, whose own department at Lehigh University issued a statement supporting evolution and condemning Intelligent Design as not scientific, publically distancing themselves from Behe. Coulter should start with Miller's Only a Theory, go on and read Prothero's Why Evolution is True, and, just for fun, she should read Richard Dawkins' book The Greatest Show on Earth, for the simple fact that she referred to him as "retarded."
I would have more respect for the Young Earth Creationists and Intelligent Design proponents if they just came out and said, "We believe in Young Earth Creationism because we believe in a literal Genesis and no evidence will convince us otherwise." All the protestations about "gaps in the fossil record", "irreducible complexity" and "teach flaws in the theory of evolution" all really boil down to that. They should at least be honest about their position and stop donning the mask of science.
Thanks to the public statements of both Rick Perry and Michele Bachmann, both in support of Intelligent Design in the classrooms, we can say with some certainty that evolution is going to be a subject during the election cycle. Given that, we can look to hear more of Coulter's moronic assertions about evolution. I'll be looking forward to it, frankly, because I can always use a good laugh.
Great post!
ReplyDeleteActually, though, I think you mean Jerry Coyne, who wrote Why Evolution is True. Donald Prothero has a great evolution book too, Evolution: What the Fossils Say and Why it Matters.
Oh my, you're quite right, Garnetstar, my mistake! Incidentally, while i mixed up the authors, I would recommend both books...
ReplyDeleteBrady Clemens