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02 May, 2008

Fight ALL CAPS With ALL CAPS: Brilliant!

I nearly got myself in trouble at work laughing my ass off. I was spelunking the comment thread on Carpetbagger's "Conservative Ben Stein insists, ‘Science leads you to killing people’" post, enjoying the number of politically active people who are also wise to Intelligent Design's antics. Right in the middle of it, I encounter this:


43. On May 1st, 2008 at 8:28 pm, Ashok said:

Ben Stein NEVER said “Science” is leading people to kill. either the author is dumb or he is a liar and deceiver with the intent to deceive all the sheep here that follow him deceived and stating that it is science that Ben Stein is attacking.

NO HE IS NOT ATTACKING SCIENCE.

BEN STEIN IS ATTEMPTING TO SHOW YOU IDIOTS THAT SCIENCE HAS BEEN HICKJACKED BY THE LIKES OF RICHARD DAWKINS AND THE OTHER STAUNCH EVOLUTIONISTS.

DO YOU UNDERSTAND???? SHALL I SPELL IT OUT AGAIN..

BEN STEIN OR THE INTELLIGENT DESIGN FOLKS ARE NOT AGAINST SCIENCE. THE INTELLIGENT DESIGN ARGUMENTS ARE SCIENTIFIC.

I have read many people write “why dont the proponents of intelligent design prove their arguements?” Well Duh… they have … and the proofs are out there.


Look familiar? Yepper. The old IDiot "I'm full of shit, so I have to USE ALL CAPS and MULTIPLE PUNCTUATION MARKS!!!! to prove HOW SERIOUS I AM" method. The only thing we were missing was the variety of fonts, and the pretty colors. No doubt we'd have had them if such things could be inserted in comments.

As PZ noted when the Expelled lackwits sent him an email:


Font size changes, random underlining, random color changes — it is so typical of creationist email. If I didn't know that these gomers had millions of dollars at their disposal, I'd consider this to be yet another rant from a lone fruitcake living in his mother's basement.

Notice too the palpable hysteria and desperation.

There must be some kind of creationist style manual out there, packaged at a bargain price along with the Wedge Document.

But the most beautiful thing came later, when a commenter turned creationist tactics against the cretin and posted this gorgeous smackdown:


49. On May 1st, 2008 at 11:51 pm, Nemodog said:

As stated by an Ashok,

“BEN STEIN OR THE INTELLIGENT DESIGN FOLKS ARE NOT AGAINST SCIENCE. THE INTELLIGENT DESIGN ARGUMENTS ARE SCIENTIFIC.”

O.K. folks, here is how the scientific method really works. It’s not a democracy. You don’t get a vote until you’ve had a basic (call it a BS) amount of scientific education from accredited (call it college for the U.S.) sources.

You get that? YOU DON’T GET A SAY AT ALL.

Now, once you’ve gotten your basic educational unit, and you have an idea (let’s call it a THESIS) you propose it, test it, and then try to convince those who have the same basic education that you’re not a
crack-pot.


We’ll call this PEER REVIEW. It’s brutal. NO ONE GETS A VOTE EXCEPT YOUR PEERS. THATS IT!

If the idea holds, you take it to the next level. You ‘challenge’ the next higher unit of learning (like people who have MS or PhDs) with your idea. They look at it, and you and your peers DON’T GET ANY VOTE AT ALL. If they think it’s stupid, the idea is completely and absolutely DESTROYED.

At this point, you have a few choices.

You can go back to school, studying under the next level, until you achieve an education in the next peer group. Then you get to vote with them.

You can rethink your idea and retest/experiment until you’re convinced that you’re right, and start at square one again.

You can slink off and tell everyone how ‘right’ you are, even though you are a crack-pot.

The issue with Intelligent Design is that it can’t be tested, and hasn’t even passed the first stage. Rather than accept that evolution has survived the peer review process for a long long time, the proponents have slunk off, and the scientific community thinks that they are basically crack-pots.

Now, personally, I suspect that you, Ashok, are in the crowd of people who don’t get a vote. I may be wrong, but I haven’t run across too many classically educated scientists who think these ideas stand even
the most basic examination.


So shush.

Nemodog fights ALL CAPS WITH ALL CAPS!!! Brilliant! And a most excellent explanation of how science works. Concise, snarky, and so pointed you could poke an IDiot's eye out with it.

2 comments:

  1. Love it. Thanks for reposting that here.

    ReplyDelete
  2. The only thing I take issue with is that you don't need a degree to understand or practice good science.

    In fact, there are some "scientists" in particular the few that are teamed w/ the DI that have advanced degrees (granted not in evo-devo) who clearly don't understand the good science and what the SM is.

    ReplyDelete

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