Peer-harassed scientist rocks evolutionary boat

World Net Daily ^ | 2-15-07 | Jack Cashill

[dbehsman]

In late December 2006, the U.S. House Committee on Government Reform issued an unflattering report on the state of affairs at one of the nation's more cherished institutions.

One day students might study this report – damningly titled "Intolerance and the Politicization of Science at the Smithsonian" – as a turning point in the history of science. For the time being, however, the report and the scandal at the heart of it attract very close to no attention in the media, let alone in the nation's schools.

Says Dr. Richard Sternberg, the Galileo of the Smithsonian scandal, "The press has not wanted to touch [the report]. Things like this aren't supposed to happen."

What did happen to Dr. Sternberg is shocking even by Washington standards. The damage done to his career is real, irreversible and symptomatic of the lengths the science establishment will go to suppress challenges to the most vulnerable of its paradigms, namely Darwinism and its derivatives.

[glorgau]

While at the same time people today very quickly forget that the 20th century was the bloodiest century in recorded human history.

In raw numbers, but most probably not percentage wise.

[aruanan]

Once the Meyer article was published, Coddington and others began to probe into Sternberg's background, asking around to see if he were a closeted "religious fundamentalist" or, God forbid, a "Republican."

Once upon a time at a party on my floor in the year before I defended my thesis, some post-doc made some comment about the NRA. I said, "Well, I'm a member. You want to see my membership card?" This woman got a look of absolute horror on her face. I thought it was pretty funny. My thesis advisor, one of the few faculty I've met who actually has a real life outside the lab, told me he thought it would probably be a good idea if I didn't advertise my NRA membership so openly.

There have been a few faculty who have their heads screwed on right, but many seem to be narrow-minded bigots. They are like most liberals (and children). They believe their view of things is simply a reflection of reality off the mirror of their minds. Because of this, they believe that people who disagree with them are doing so either because they are defective--they cannot understand reality--or evil--they understand that things are exactly the way the liberal thinks but, because of evil, anti-human perversity, they choose to oppose them.

I have also seen that academic science appears to select for mental and emotional pathology. It tends to select for fairly articulate and intelligent people who feel more comfortable in their own little world that they ruthlessly control. People are means to whatever ends they have chosen--usually getting more grant money. They say that to be successful you have to "eat, drink, and breathe science". I have heard one say that even when he's home he's constantly thinking about science. He has no sense of humor. He commits egregious social faux pas. He expects people to have read his mind. If he doesn't understand you, it's because, as he says, you failed to communicate clearly.

[ndt]

"I am surprised that this fellow Sternberg hasn't filed a lawsuit. "

For what? He was an unpaid research assistant at the Smithsonian not an employee.

[dread78645]

You would think Mr. Cashill might actually try to learn some facts about the stories he writes.

The Sternberg Saga Continues

[DocRock]

bookmark

[onedoug]

Yet the scientific method - which allowed us to defeat Japan in WWI - seems as out as ever in convincing this scientifically minded person that any more than 75% of evolution is a viable theory.

[onedoug]

I meant WWII.

Time for bed.

[taxesareforever]

I am really surprised (NOT) that you evos haven't latched on to Dr.Stenberg as one of your poster boys. I mean, his credentials certainly must pass your muster. This from Dr.Stenberg's website:

I hold two PhDs in the area of evolutionary biology, one in molecular (DNA) evolution and the other in systems theory and theoretical biology. I have published more than 30 articles in peer-reviewed scientific books and publications. My current areas of research and writing are primarily in the areas of evolutionary theory and systematics.

[Right in Wisconsin]

normally I wouldn't say anything, but your blatant equivocation of the Catholic church (of which I am a proud member for life) with liberal institutionalized beliefs that are loony at best is way out of line.

From the bottom of my heart - Thank You. Leaving the Church is the best thing you could have done to serve the Church. What a rotten and insulting person you are.

[ndt]

"I am really surprised (NOT) that you evos haven't latched on to Dr.Stenberg as one of your poster boys."

Why? Not to minimize the importance of education, but PhDs are a dime a dozen in the world of actual researchers.

[taxesareforever]

Why? Not to minimize the importance of education, but PhDs are a dime a dozen in the world of actual researchers.

WOW! I'll go back and find it but one of your staunch evos was touting his PhD as authenication. Maybe you two can duke it out.

[si tacuissem]

In late December 2006, the U.S. House Committee on Government Reform issued an unflattering report on the state of affairs at one of the nation's more cherished institutions.

One day students might study this report – damningly titled "Intolerance and the Politicization of Science at the Smithsonian" – as a turning point in the history of science.[..]

I'm afraid that said students will search this report in vain - as there is -AFAIK - no report issued by the U.S. House Committee. Rather, it appears to be a report from the staff of the committee to Rep. Mark Souder only. The report is hosted on Souder's website, not the committee website, and there is nothing to indicate that it is an official committee report.

[timer]

Ok, I put on my blogger's hip waders and sloshed through it. His main point : natural selection is not forward looking. Well, we COULD say that he's looking at it in a serial sense, one monkey typing on one typewriter to generate 4^9999 probabilities. Obviously the cambrian explosion was a time of massive PARALLEL computing, anything and everything was being tried as a response to being the top predator; in a new, oxygen-rich environment.

There is a theorem in mathematics called the Pappas Theorem of self organization. Using his ball and string analogy : put 100 dots at random places on a sheet of paper. Now connect each dot with each other dot by lines, a continuous line from #1 to #2(any other dot)to #3, #4....to #100 and back to #1 again. It looks just like random dots connected by random length/angle lines, a chaotic mess.

NOW take the center points of each line and draw a SECOND line between each center dot. Thus you'll see it gets a bit smaller but almost equally messy/chaotic. Then a THIRD line(iteration)between those NEW second line-dots, then a FOURTH, FIFTH.....

LO and BEHOLD : ORDER begins to appear almost like magic as either an oval or figure 8 appears as the re-re-re-....iterated figure gets smaller and smaller.

You can do this right on your own TV screen with the right software program. My sotware engineer nephew did such a program for me several years ago now. As you zoom in(the figure gets smaller and smaller)sure enough : no matter how many random points you start with, it ALWAYS becomes an oval or figure 8.

Dr Sternberg obviously isn't aware of the Pappas Theorem where order NATURALLY appears from chaos, and I'm sure there are other self-ordering theorems out there as well. He also doesn't understand the Jurassic Park principle : Life always finds a way...

Life is tenacious, from ice worms to hot springs algae, it is OPPORTUNISTIC, exploiting every possible niche. Even those purported micro-organisms in martian rocks(meteorites found in antarctica) may be "ice worms" as well.

Another thing Dr Sternberg overlooks is micro-organisms in the GROUND. It is said that perhaps 2/3rds of earth bio-mass is these rock-dwelling bacteria. He's only looking at a 5M to 10M window of SURFACE mutatagenic changes. What if these complex forms/cells had been evolving for a billion years UNDER the ground and they only emerged when SURFACE conditions allowed?

So the debate continues. Would anyone here like to hear an explanation of what the period from 4.4B to 3.9B was like, and how Gen 2:6 is a KEY CLUE?

[Aquinasfan]

100 years from now they will look at us as about as smart as the Papeocracy insisting Gallileo declare the earth as the center of the universe!

At the time of the Galileo controversy, a bishop and cardinal were funding Copernicus' research into heliocentrism.

Copernicus dedicated his most famous work, On the Revolution of the Celestial Orbs, in which he gave an excellent account of heliocentricity, to Pope Paul III, who he hoped would protect him from Protestant attacks.

Copernicus entrusted this work to Andreas Osiander, a Lutheran clergyman who knew that Protestant reaction to it would be negative, since Martin Luther seemed to have condemned the new theory, and, as a result, the book would be condemned. Osiander wrote a preface to the book, in which heliocentrism was presented only as a theory that would account for the movements of the planets more simply than geocentrism did—something Copernicus did not intend.

The (fallible) Church tribunal that condemned Galileo to house arrest objected to his insistence that the Church teach heliocentrism as dogmatic fact. Interestingly enough, the evidence that Galileo presented at the time, in favor of his theory, was scientifically erroneous.

Why Did the Catholic Church Condemn Galileo?

[Aquinasfan]

Meyer contended that neo-Darwinism has failed to provide a convincing explanation for the massive infusion of new genetic information into the fossil record a reported 570 million years ago.

...Meyer took a stab at it, arguing deductively that only "rational agents" have shown the ability to design and organize functional, information-rich systems. "Natural selection lacks foresight," Meyer continued. "What natural selection lacks, intelligent selection – purposive or goal-directed design – provides."

"The man is obviously insane." --Airplane II (The Sequel) < /s>

Today, almost inevitably, the road to such hell is paved with e-mail. But even by the standards of the contemporary academy, the e-mail campaign to punish Sternberg was an impressively swift and catty one.

WND should stay away from this rhetoric and let the facts speak for themselves. This just turns off the fence-sitters. Their own words are damning enough:

"if he had any class he would either entirely desist or resign his appointment."

"This is not about the other RAs. This is only about you." ..."You are being treated differently, but you know perfectly well why you're being treated differently."

[thedilg]

[While at the same time people today very quickly forget that the 20th century was the bloodiest century in recorded human history.]

Wars were bloody in the 20th century but they were as a tea party compared to the slaughter of 45 million babies in the womb. I have no idea of the world count but it no doubt is an order of magnitude greater. China by itself probably comes close to that number.

Godspeed, The Dilg

[Elsie]

I find it disturbing that people in general today look back at society 100, 200, 300 or more years ago, and instantly come to the conclusion that those people in the past were mostly primative barbarians.

You sure got THIS right!!

I particularly like the anti-Bible folks who sneer down their elegant noses at the 'illiterate bronze-age nomadic goatheaders'!

[Elsie]

[Elsie]

Wars were bloody in the 20th century but they were as a tea party compared to the slaughter of 45 million babies in the womb.

HMMmmm...

You think the Democrats would DO something to end this.

After all; EVERYTHING they do is for the chilrun!!!

[Teacher317]

While at the same time people today very quickly forget that the 20th century was the bloodiest century in recorded human history.

Only because the 21st will make the 20th look like child's play.