I’m rather peeved and disappointed, too. The Discovery Institute Media Complaints Division posts a rebuke of bad bloggers and scientists who are mean to their shills, and there’s a link in there to Pharyngula…and I thought for sure it would be whining about something I said.
But no. The link is directly to one of Scott’s comments.
Poor guy. Now he’s going to have Casey Luskin squeaking at him. The rest of you are going to have to work at catching up by hurting the DI’s feelings badly enough that they point at you and cry. (You’re going to have to really work to beat me out, though—they have invoked my unholy, fearful name in their fundraising literature.)
I’m so jealous! :-(
Way to go Scott! :-)
Scott has a Order of Molly for a reason.
Speaking of which, when are you going to announce the new winner, PZ? it’s been almost a month since the voting.
In other words, don’t talk about the science. Just attack the person’s character, motives and credentials.
Yup, that will do wonders for the darwinian cause. Keep it up!
So in order to prevent them from having “credibility”, we’ll just call them liars, dishonest and “enemies of civilization”.
Wowzer! This is not the way a rational scientist acts when a theory he defends is questioned. However, this is a very common performance for religious believer to do, when he has his faith under scrutinity, and he can’t defend it rationaly.
Don’t forget that Scott Hatfield, OM has his own blog now.
Sorry Mats but Scott has it right on this one. Until ID actually has some published data that we can talk about and until ID advocates begin to act in a reputable manner then any other response to them is going to be counterproductive. Scientists look at papers to view the evidence and depending on what they find they are prepared to change their minds. ID advocates on the other hand read scientific papers simply to mine quotes in support of their unwavering faith.
Even going by the Wedge document’s plans for where ID should be by this time they are hopelessly behind schedule in terms of the expected numbers of pro-ID peer reviewed papers published.
P.Z., while I am an infrequent poster and not quotable at all, I am proud to be a small part of Pharyngula. Keep up the fine work, everyone. Piss ’em off, then shut ’em down!
Seems Scott has earned yet another public acclaim. Go Scott!
Btw, when did entitling a religiously motivated person “reverend” become an example of “name-calling”? The Divine wind Institute moves in mysterious ways…
Seems Scott has earned yet another public acclaim. Go Scott!
Btw, when did entitling a religiously motivated person “reverend” become an example of “name-calling”? The Divine wind Institute moves in mysterious ways…
Well, Mats, the problem is that those on the side of science go way out of their way to avoid calling someone a liar. And it has to stop. If we won’t say that someone is lying, plain and simple, then we are giving them a free pass.
And it’s avoiding why we are arguing anyways! We want these liars confronted… because they are lying! Prancing around that point is more than counterproductive, it’s almost dishonest.
And besides, if someone says prove it, we can. That makes the debate swing over to our terms, and gives a good reason for us to be giving our points.
Here, look at this example I’m making up:
1. “Well, that’s not quite right, That’s not the theory of evolution.”
2. “That’s an outright lie!”
In number one, we give out correct information, but control is on the other party, and the speaker will not get time for his full rebuttal.
Whereas in number 2, the automatic response is “prove it”, or “why?” and at that time, you gain control of the argument, and are given more time to expound the ENTIRE line of your reasoning.
This is not a evil way to argue, this is a valid tactic, and nothing dishonest has happened. If no one asks why your opponent is lying, then volunteer to say why. say: “hes lying, and I’ll tell you why.”
This is just basically the same as avoiding the passive voice in writing. We have the truth on our side, but if we never strongly assert, then we will never be taken seriously.
Mats, I have to wonder if it requires a lot of practice to be this willfully dense, or if it comes naturally to you.
Just for fun I am going to emphasize the important part of this sentence.
What do you suppose he meant by “this kind of forum”? Would it be:
a) friendly conversations with friends, relatives and co-workers
b) respected, peer-reviewed scientific journals
or
c) ten-minute radio debates for lay audiences, where the creationist side has shown no interest in anything but throwing up a smokescreen of lies and misrepresentations?
But, but, but, I’m being mean TOO!!! It’s a conspiracy!
when did entitling a religiously motivated person “reverend” become an example of “name-calling”?
Hey bub, they are religion when they want to be, and science when they want to be, and don’t you ever forget it.
Wow… and to think that Mr Hatfield is almost as mild-mannered as our host.
So, I looked at Casey Luskin’s whine, and my first reaction was, “Who do I have to bite to get attention from these people?”
My second reaction was, “No, that’s whom do I have to bite to get attention from these people.”
My third reaction, after a closer perusal, was a chortle of glee. Luskin manages to reference, not once but twice, the list of “over 700 doctoral scientists who dissent from Darwinian evolution”. Yeah, and how many of them are named Steve?
Individuals that claim theistic belief and still reject creationist nonsense frighten the creationists the most, because “you have to accept this or abandon God!” is their only argument with teeth.
Hatfield says nothing that others haven’t said better, and quite a lot of what he says is just stupid. But the stupid stuff is what makes him such a threat to people who say even dumber things.
Stop it Cal, you’re making him blush.
It’s an honor to be criticized by such cretins. As Ivins would have said, “Good on ya, Scott!”
Awesome, Scott!!!! You’re getting to them.
I just read Scott’s comment for the first time, and I applaud him wholeheartedly. Of course, this kind of sucks because I have Dembski to thank for it. Nonetheless it is basically the tactic I employ, and to good effect. Not being a biologist, I don’t have the option of debating allele frequencies with them. I attack three glaring weaknesses in their position that any intelligent person can grasp:
1) There is near universal rejection of what they have to say from accomplished scientists in every one of the MANY relevant areas of study.
2) They produce practically no science of their own, and what they do is of abysmal quality at best.
These are easy to establish, Project Steve and the website of their failed journal, being two of my favorite evidences to bring to light. After that, it’s pretty much game over, because the only way they can even begin to explain any of this is to scream “conspiracy!”, but that becomes laughable in light of the recent history of scientific progress with radical ideas. If ever an idea would be rejected because of biases, it would have been quantum mechanics, which, once you boil off ID’s PR fat, is weirder than ID ever dreamed of being.
Oh sure, the faithful will argue these points to the bitter end. Doesn’t matter, they aren’t the target market for our ideas anyway. It’s the uncommitted, sometimes uncaring middle we are after. Just get them aware of what to watch out for so their city doesn’t end up being the next Dover.
The best way to get folks to swing is to lob a softball.
The following are absolutely true.
—- Mutation does not generate have a special method for generating useful information. In fact, in context of mutation it doesn’t generate useful anything (useful is really a determination of natural selection, mutation just makes the information… selection figures out if it is useful).
—- Despite claims by evolutionists that you can’t strongly evidence design by looking at something, you can. From computer programs to frogs, there are actually pretty clear indicators whether something is the product of design or not. I write code, and spend a lot of time working with evolutionary algorithms, and I can tell you the difference between the code is pretty much night and day. Designed things typically show a fairly uniform intelligence, things are modular (everything has it’s place next to other related stuff), and they do not reproduce. Evolved solutions are either freakishly stupid or extremely intelligent with a rare shade of gray between, unrelated things not only don’t have their own section but they latch onto each other is rather absurd ways, and they always reproduce. Sadly for the creationists however, this clearly suggests that frogs are evolved and computers programs are not. What little evidence we have to go by strongly suggests design for many non-living things and evolution for all living things.
—- I have never seen a half-man, half-monkey.
—- I don’t think that human beings could have been formed by chance.
—- Irreducible complexity is actually a useful and definite state. Though trivial to evolve such situations and laughable to suggest that such things can’t evolve. The actual state of being irreducibly complex isn’t complete poppycock.
Swing batter!
First off, kudos to Scott for getting under their skin. Seriously. There’s nothing but surface to the ID leaders, and by getting under it and having them absolutely admit to your doing so, you’ve gotten them to demonstrate heir superficiality in no uncertain terms.
Second off, I have to agree with MartinC on this. There’s no way to debate the merits of ID’s snake oil on the basis of scientific merit because a) they have none and b) they don’t want any; its a religiously and politically motivated ideology that has nothing to do with science. The only thing that can be done is to make apparent their lack of depth (as Scott has done so well!) and their basic dishonesty; the latter relies not on debating science with them, but only on showing specific instances where they are ignoring facts or else intentionally lying to their own followers, as they so often do.
ID is essentially a cult; cults come down to the worship of personalities. Show the worshipers that the personalities have lied to them, and a good many will be smart enough and have enough dignity not to stand for it after awhile, I think.
Scott,
Nice job. Great comment (as usual). That’s why you have the OM.
I’ll be adding your blog to my daily reading.
(PZ, can you count Scott as a blogchild?)
MikeG
Luskin manages to reference, not once but twice, the list of “over 700 doctoral scientists who dissent from Darwinian evolution”. Yeah, and how many of them are named Steve?
And how many of them are like this retired prof who’s on the list:
“I’m kind of embarrassed that I ever got involved with this,” Davidson says.
He was shocked, he says, when he saw the Discovery Institute was calling evolution a “theory in crisis.”
“It’s laughable: There have been millions of experiments over more than a century that support evolution,” he says. “There’s always questions being asked about parts of the theory, as there are with any theory, but there’s no real scientific controversy about it.”
Tatarize:
Mark Chu-Carroll had a thorough debunking of the “irreducible complexity” concept.
You can find it here:
http://scienceblogs.com/goodmath/2006/06/the_problem_with_irreducibly_c_1.php
Tatarize, et al…a semi-earnest question: any thoughts on why the Designer, according to you, designed a universe in which mutations cannot ever be “useful”?
No such thing as bad press PZ. DI and their ID bullshit need to get owned before they become a big NYSE commodity. An “irreducibly complex” commodity for swing traders inspired by Yahweh.
Wow, what a great comment by Scott. He’s absolutely right, too. If we argue about specific facts, we’re automatically elevating them to the level of scientist. It gets quite tedious. Questioning where they get their “facts” really gets on their nerves and exposes their motives. This also works with global warming deniers. You’d be surprised to know how many got it from Michael Crichton.
We love you Scott!
Now I have to go see if I can RSS your blog…
Hmmm… I must have missed the part where Scott called someone a name in that post. Unless, of course, the nasty name he used was “Reverend”.
Certainly he can’t be faulted for calling someone who lies about their credentials a liar, so I can’t think of what eles it COULD be.
Congrats, Scott. I couldn’t even aspire to such greatness!
Great job Scott. I agree – debate science when the debate is about science, but don’t waste your time when you are dealing with propagandists.
What’s weird is that this is my name too (whenever we go out…). It’s surreal seeing your name in the title of a popular blog when it isn’t actually you. I wish it were, except I’m not that informed nor well-spoken.
I detect a high degree of satire envy on the part of DI. Scott writes a humorous piece — the best they’ve been able to do is fart noises.
Maybe that’s because “half-man-half-monkeys” are a kind of strawman erected by creationists and their idiot followers?
How many times do I have to repeat this?
Humans, other great and not so greats apes are not descended from monkeys: monkeys, and apes share a common ancestor: monkeys, and apes share a common ancestor with lemurs, tarsiers, bushbabies, and loris, forming the order Primates: Primates, in turn, share a common ancestor with flying lemurs, who all, in turn, share a common ancestor with tree shrews, rodents and rabbits to form the taxon Euarchontoglires.
Why is that so difficult to comprehend?
No, it is not. Every single example of “irreducible complexity” has been debunked.
If the immune system is irreducibly complex, then why is the immune system of lampreys less complex than that of humans? Why is the immune system of a starfish simpler than either humans or lampreys?
If the bacterial flagellum is irreducibly complex, then why can E. coli bacteria still produce fully functional flagella with only half of their flagellum-protein genes functioning? If it’s supposed to be the exact same designed flagellum, then why does the number of component proteins differ with each bacteria family?
If the “Blood-Clotting Cascade” is irreducibly complex, then why does it use the same proteases used in digestion to digest proteinaceous foods, to break down platelets and red blood cells?
How does the regulation of chloroquinone resistance in Plasmodium falciparum disprove the fact that we humans have evolved and are still evolving?
In fact, none of the idiots at the Discovery Institute, not Wells, not Dembski, and especially not Behe, have ever bothered to show any sort of useful applications “Intelligent Design,” or “Irreducible Complexity” have for Biology, or even Science.
To suggest that “Irreducible Complexity” may be useful is as fabulous an untruth as me claiming that Mr Scott Hatfield transforms into a 3 ton Siberian tiger on the nights of the full moon. I almost wish it were true, but, everyone must realize that Life is cruel as it is now, and we must not aggravate it with vainglorious stupidity.
OK, Gotta agree with ya all, I’m jealous too. Still, props where props are due. NICE ONE SCOTT!
hehehe I wondered why I was getting blog-hits on that first fr*ming post again!
Blake– Those were my first thoughts too. But I learned a new word today! Let me try it:
“Seemingly everything ID Creationists write, on topics ranging from philosophy to any field of science, is complete and utter dross. Actually, DI ‘fellows’ can be described using the word dross as well. Dross!”
How about a simple question, Tatarize, one that doesn’t require any knowledge of biology at all. A softball for you, as it were.
Define “information” in an objective manner and describe how to measure it.
We’ll move on to the applications to genetics after that.
In following the link to Scott’s comments, I started reading the other comments on that page and came upon this one, also by Scott
————————–
Scott Hatfield (#90):
“Want to collaborate on a book titled Creationism: The Unholy Lie? I thought of that title the other day and immediately started wondering if it would sell. . . .”
—————————–
I think it’s a great title, too, and I hope it gets written.
PZ,
I can’t wait for your post on Sean Carroll’s (the evo-devo one) review of Behe’s new screed in today’s Science. Behe most likely will present with a second anus.
Oh, sorry, that was Blake Stacey talking to Scott.
Well, it’s still a great title.
1. Scott, you
klobberedKlugmaned the guy! :-)2. Is there something terribly wrong with me? I can’t shake the feeling that just about everyone here completely misinterpreted Tatarize’s post.
The DI article you linked to has prompted me to buy The Panda’s Black Box. Looks like a good read. Thanks, DI.
Blake Stacey, OM wrote:
Seven
You got under their skin, Scott – which is an achievement since it’s so danged thin. ;-)
This whole “name-calling” charge is like the “war on Christmas” charge – “since they won’t make the crime fit the punishment we’ll just punish them some more.” The DI fellows have no more horse left to flog. They’re desperate. Keep the heat on!
I hurriedly said: I attack three glaring weaknesses in their position that any intelligent person can grasp: 1) … 2)…
Uh, yeah. Never blog on your way out the door.
Anyway, the third weakness is of course the overwhelming representation of wacky fundamentalists in the ID ranks. It would be interesting to see if their theological degrees outnumber their biology, geology, and paleontology degrees combined (counting only reputable institutions of course). A bottle of single malt scotch says they do.
Hang on, Scott’s post was about how to frame an argument against the DI effectively, and the DI doesn’t like it. Doesn’t that suggest that framing actually wor…
Why are you all looking at me like that?
Bob
To all who speak of the Order of the Molly: It is not an award. It is an exclusive group. One does not win an Order of Molly or an OM. They are accepted into the group.
“I’d like an order of Molly with a side of snark.”
“Want to collaborate on a book titled Creationism: The Unholy Lie? I thought of that title the other day and immediately started wondering if it would sell. . . .”
—————————–
I think it’s a great title, too, and I hope it gets written.
It’s a good title but it’s not really an honest one because creationists talk to their god all the time and their god doesn’t really have a problem with what they are doing, so it wouldn’t be fair to have “Unholy” in the title there. Their god has a problem with what Mr. Hatfield is doing, and Mr. Hatfield’s god has a problem with what creationists are doing, therefore they are talking to different gods. It’s just basic logic. Granted, both of their gods are intelligent and designers of the universe, but still.
Granted, both of their gods are intelligent and designers of the universe, but still.
Oh yeah, I almost forgot. And both of their gods fly up into the sky like they have invisible birdie wings too. But still.
To all who are criticizing Tatarize, or assume that s/he is a creationist:
I suggest you read their post again. Pay attention this time.
Xanthir: The statement that “mutation makes information” is questionable, to say the least. I look forward to Tatarize’s explaination.
That statement is slightly funny, but overall correct as long as you don’t get too hung up on definitions.
Tat says that mutation makes information (in the actual mathematical sense). This is simple truth. It is then up to selection to determine what information is useful. This is also true – mutation itself doesn’t drive evolution, or else it really *would* be all based on random chance.
Tat simply uses some wording that automatically gets our hackles up. Nothing they say is actually controversial or wrong, however.
Some people have even debunked what they *thought* Tatarize was talking about incorrectly. #22, for example, links over to a post of MarkCC’s to talk about how irreducible complexity is wrong.
The problem? Mark’s post on that subject was off-base. I love the guy, and it was really really interesting to learn about all that he talked about, but IC isn’t about making the smallest possible system, it’s about making a system that can no longer function if you knock out any part of it. This *can* be proven, experimentally no less. For example, a tripod chair is IC. If I knock out a leg, it will fall over.
The problem with IC isn’t that it’s ill-defined (though it may very well be, in common use) or that it’s theoretically impossible to talk about (it’s not), it’s that morons who don’t understand how evolution in general, and mutations in specific, work try to claim that IC systems couldn’t evolve. This is because they are stupid and assume that every mutation is additive, and no mutation ever merely changes a function or removes functionality. In other words, IC is legitimate, but it has been hijacked by morons who misconstrue the implications.
Coming from Caledonian, that’s basically a proposal of marriage.
Nice work, Scott.
… they have invoked my unholy, fearful name in their fundraising literature
Oh, cool, so you’ve been made a Fellow? Congratulations!
But, but… Jonathan Wells has Ph.D. in theology from Yale (and another one in molecular biology). Science or religion? Science and religion? This is soo confusing!
[Actually, I think I know more people who are atheist and have studied theology. But Wells is such a prime example of, of, …, um, reverence. :-o]
That sounds freakishly like bureaucracies. (Except for the intelligence part.) [Gasp! They are alive!]
But, but… Jonathan Wells has Ph.D. in theology from Yale (and another one in molecular biology). Science or religion? Science and religion? This is soo confusing!
[Actually, I think I know more people who are atheist and have studied theology. But Wells is such a prime example of, of, …, um, reverence. :-o]
That sounds freakishly like bureaucracies. (Except for the intelligence part.) [Gasp! They are alive!]
Scott has it absolutely right.
His approach may not meet the standards of rational debate, but as anyone who has followed the ID/creationist/whateverthehellitisthisweek argument knows, this isn’t about rationality any more than it’s about science.
Like their intellectual brethren the holocaust deniers, what the anti-evolutionists want more than anything is the appearance of being taken seriously. It gives them respectability and feeds into their delusions.
By focusing on the meta-argument (that this is an effort to make a cramped, narrow-minded and theologically rather peculiar stream of religious thought into a replacement for science and rationality) Scott’s argument focuses on what’s really happening. It deprives them of the respect they so desperately crave in these confrontations (they are not debates, much less scientific discussions) it shows how marginal their pretensions actually are.
In effect it cuts them off at the knees. It also turns their own tactics back on them. They absolutely cannot stand that.
No, it’s not rational debate and no it’s not pretty, but anyone who thinks these auto-de-fes are about either rationality or debate simply hasn’t been paying attention.
Go Scott! And go thou and do thee likewise.
Luskin manages to reference, not once but twice, the list of “over 700 doctoral scientists who dissent from Darwinian evolution”. Yeah, and how many of them are named Steve?
How many of them are even biologists? Or biochemists? Last I checked it was about half.
And how many have published findings that cast legitimate doubt on any of the theories underpinning Evolution? Last I checked it was about… none?
At first, I too misinterpreted Tatarize’s post but upon re-examination:
—- … mutation just makes the information… selection figures out if it is useful).
This is exactly Darwin’s key insight behind “The Origin of Species”, evolution as exampled by domestic animal breeding was well understood at the time, it was the idea of random variation coupled with natural selection that was the key to explaining speciation.
—- … What little evidence we have to go by strongly suggests design for many non-living things and evolution for all living things.
—- I have never seen a half-man, half-monkey.
True statement. It is an assumption to believe Tatarize is using this as an argument against evolution.
—- I don’t think that human beings could have been formed by chance.
Again true and not necessarily an argument for special creation. Evolution is not simply chance, but random variation plus selection. Which makes it not purely chance.
—- Irreducible complexity is actually a useful and definite state. Though trivial to evolve such situations and laughable to suggest that such things can’t evolve[emphasis added]. The actual state of being irreducibly complex isn’t complete poppycock.
*ding ding ding ding ding*
We have a winner! :-)
A couple of months ago, I listened to about 40 “ID The Future” podcasts in about two days. So don’t tell me about Casey Luskin.
My favorite Casey moments are when he has ID fellows as “guests” — it reminds me of when I was seven and I held up a broken tape recorder microphone and “interviewed” my mother.
dorkafork wrote:
I make it around 74 out of 704 – although that’s just going by how they’re categorized in the DI list.
And how many of them are named Scott? Just wondering. (How about Stephanie…)
Xnathir:
Tat says that mutation makes information (in the actual mathematical sense). This is simple truth.
Call me “hung up on definitions”, but it isn’t true or simple in the mathematical sense (nor did Tatarize claim so). I suspect that Tatarize is using it in a subjective sense, which is fine, but needs to be explained.
Definitions are kind of important. For instance, the word “theory” gets flung around for things that aren’t theories, and it confuses the issue. Same with “information”, “complexity” (the latter is used as a synonym for “complicated”, but mathematically they are non-overlapping).
In fact, irreducible complexity is represented by the IDiots as irreducible complicatedness to the “masses”, because of this difference in definitions.
PZ, et al.
First — I’m a consultant (sorry)! And this is a meta-rant (double sorry)! and this is awfully long (triple sorry — you’rrrrre Out!) and this is a fourth meta comment (Scott appears to be a truly awesome communicator who understand the art and science of using the channel)
However, to the point — my job requires me to communicate quickly and clearly, on many levels, to a variety of audiences and for a variety of purposes — often simultaneously. That’s rarely easy — and often means I cannot say EXACTLY what I WANT to say in exactly the way I want to say it. I don’t ‘dumb down’ my message — but I do need to re-state, and perhaps change language, metaphors, and references.
Content counts most definititely — but the delivery method really counts if you want to ensure reception of your content — and you’re at the mercy of the delivery channels in every case.
Professors (sorry, PZ) generally control their delivery channel (lectures, etc). They don’t control media.
I rarely if ever control the delivery channel. I sometimes control the initial presentation — but rarely have any editorial control over subsequent dissemination.
Therefore I need to control my content at a very low level — every statement and every slide must make sense on it’s own merits. (It might only be a tiny part of the overall message — but the statement should still stand on it’s own). Every summary must be capable of being read with or without the ‘hip pocket’ detail that makes everything ‘beautifully clear’.
I need to be prepared for reduction or elimination of my timeslot (you had 2 hours — can you give us a 5 minute summary – we’re running behind… or… we’ve had to cancel – can you just send us the presentation?)
I need to be prepared to do this ‘on the fly’ and essentially off the cuff. But that doesn’t mean I can’t be prepared for it.
This is the consultant’s equivalent of the soundbite.
And this is not news!
Modern political speechwriters know this and politicians use this every day — they understand the art of the soundbite within today’s media channels (tv, print, and journals). They know than very few of their actual words can or will be used. But they understand that the ‘message’ needs to be repeated, and be repeatable in tiny chunks. They rely on frequent repetition to get the overall message across (it’s like doing a shotgun PCR analysis — you get tiny little chunks that look in themselves to be meaningless…. but overall you get enough overlapping pieces to make sense of the whole message)
This is very different from debate (ever read the ‘chamber’ speeches of any popular politician versus their ‘pulpit’ or campaign speeches?). As ‘media’ started to deliver ‘edited highlights’ of speeches, in Pathe news and the like, ‘people’ gradually transitioned to getting their knowledge of current affairs in ‘quotes’ rather than ‘editorial reportage’.
Is this movement necessarily bad — not really. But it is different. And it is not amenable to ‘socratic discourse’! (A challenge for anyone whoe life revovles around discussion – scientists, consultants, lawyers, …)
Everyone has heard Churchill’s ‘we will fight them on the beaches…’ or Kennedy’s ‘ask not what your country can do for you…’ Did anyone who heard those speeches come away with much more? Does anyone today remember anything else? Other than professionals? – probably not! Why should we *need* anything more?
In science, as in so many other areas we have to be confident that our message is compelling in every particular. Certainly compelling enough to warrant repeat. With repetition we then have the opportunity to flavor our message, and add nuances impossible to state in our initial 15 seconds of fame.
Science needs the same level of communicability as religious or political ‘soundbites’. We need viral messages (like the Xians have in ‘godditit’, or ‘just a theory’ or the GOP have in ‘we are the party of smaller government’).
We need messages that are intrinsically clear (and that don’t use words like intrinsic!).
The message needs to be ‘foundationally true’ in principle but (as the Xians & GOP teach us) need not be ‘100% factually true’! Most people don’t care — they only care if what you say conflicts with their world view…. If you say something ‘controversial’ they might ‘prick their ears’ to hear more next time… or vilify you as ‘evil’. (Just try Universal Health Care in a Republican stronghold, or ‘forbes-esque’ tax breaks in a union hall).
Regardless — your message is out and can grow!
If you’ve been boxed — and do nothing the redefine the box – you’ll never be able to be controversial, you’ll never be able to (sorry) re-frame their opinion of you and your message.
From a memetic perspective, this is death.
Content counts — but you need to rely on messengers who don’t have the same reverence as you for every one of your words! So use the right words for the audience… Rely on repetition, summarisation, allusion, commonality to get as much of your message across as you can in every single phrase.
This is more post/rant than I would normally do, but I only had only a few minutes to put this together.
TAK!
tony
Put in gaming terms, gratz Scott.
All these compliments have me blushing, but I must say my favorite was Caledonian’s ‘proposal of marriage.’
(cue: “As Time Goes By”)
You know, old Scot, this could be the beginning of a beautiful relationship.
At any rate, thanks to everybody for the kind words. NOW…about my blog. Please! I’m a newbie, and I’m in the middle of finals. I would feel terrible if anyone expected me to show the range or depth shown on this blog. But from time to time I will post there, and also as a guest on Dr. Madhu Katti’s blog ‘EvolveFresno’. I’m grateful to be part of the conversation among those who want to defend science education. Thanks…..SH
Scott Hatfield, OM:
You can always use your blog as a place to recycle your longer statements here in the Pharyngula threads. At the very least, it makes one’s statements easier to find!
Re # 63 “Please! I’m a newbie, and I’m in the middle of finals.”
So we should ignore the picture of your nephew on your blog who is clearly batting right-handed not left-handed?
Kristine wrote:
6 Scotts, no Stephanies (unless hidden away as a middle initial)
Re #66: My nephew is left-handed. In the picture that was up there, the hitter was not my nephew, who was instead catching. I’ve since changed it as I work on getting the blog visually pretty, and also because my nephew was named a Freshman All-American. This time, I put his mug shot in a post and attached links to his latest accomplishments.
Thanks a bunch for checking out my poor excuse for a blog, though. I’m working on it! SH
At least people eventually determined which side I was on. I thought I had made it pretty clear. A number of people reread my comments, and understood them properly. They were very much crafted to look wrong but to be absolutely correct. I only notice one comment I care address, for the sake of posterity as this is a dead thread.
Tat says that mutation makes information (in the actual mathematical sense). This is simple truth.
Call me “hung up on definitions”, but it isn’t true or simple in the mathematical sense (nor did Tatarize claim so).
It is quite true in the mathematical sense, and that’s how I meant it. Frankly, TV static has more information than TV programs. Mutation produces information, selection sorts out if that information was useful. The question of how do you produce a “useful mutation” is actually the question “how does evolution work”. Also, with useful genes being copied several times, it does make pretty sure that no information is lost by modification of any copy of that gene (rather information is now gained as we need to describe how the copies differ). Read Shannon’s original paper on information theory.