Re: Pathetic attacks on Darwin

On 26-Mar-25 10:23, RonO wrote:

https://evolutionnews.org/2025/03/west-heres-why-we-cant-just-make- peace-with-darwin/
 https://evolutionnews.org/2025/03/doug-axe-on-darwinian-evolution-one- of-the-weakest-most-pathetic-scientific-theories/
 The ID perps can't quit making stupid claims about Darwin and his observation of natural selection in nature.
 MarkE wants to continue to lie to himself about "Darwinism".  The simple fact is that natural selection has been known to not be the only factor in the evolution of the current diversity of life on earth for a very long time.  It is just one factor, and a factor that anyone with enough training can go out into nature and collect data consistent with it continuing to act in nature today.  ID perps like Dembski and Behe have admitted that natural selection could be the designer of examples of evolution that we have.  Behe's stupid argument about "devolution" actually claims that natural selection would be expected to be responsible for things like the evolution of whales where a lot of the genes that had evolved to work in creating terrestrial tetrapods for over 200 million years had to be broken for the whales to go back to an aquatic lifestyle.  The broken genes were still in the whale genomes and had obviously evolved from functional sequences of the close terrestrial relatives of whales, but Behe just claimed that it was a bad type of evolution in order to make negative claims of natural selection.  Behe actually shot himself in the head by claiming that whales evolved when his designer wasn't looking and the evolution was due to natural selection because natural selection would have been expected to select for the broken genes and the results of breaking them, while his designer would have done a better job of evolving whales.
 West's denial article cites Axe's denial article.  "(See, “Doug Axe on Darwinian Evolution: ‘One of the Weakest, Most Pathetic Scientific Theories.’”)"  This is obviously just stupid and dishonest denial because Phillip Johnson sat in court every day of testimony for the Dover IDiotic creationist fiasco and came to the conclusion that the ID perps had nothing equivalent to biological evolution to put forward.  He admitted that the ID science had never existed, and could not compete with the real science.  Axe's lie about what he is calling Darwinian evolution means that the ID scam is so much weaker and pathetic than the actual science that there isn't much doubt about why the ID perps decided to start running the bait and switch on creationist rubes instead of give them any of the weak and pathetic ID science.
 West claims that Darwinism is corrosive, but even though he never defines Darwinism he is just objecting to what science has to be in order to function in the real world.  Biological evolution in nature is just an affront to his religious beliefs.  Behe and Denton have been telling the other ID perps that biological evolution is just a fact of nature since the turn of the century, but ID perps like West and Axe have never been able to accept reality.
 Whining about Darwinism is just stupid at this point in the ID perp's bait and switch ID creationist scam.  The only supporter that the ID perps have left on TO is MarkE because MarkE has never been able to accept reality just like West and Axe.  All the other IDiots quit the ID scam because they realized that there wasn't any ID science that they wanted the ID perps to produce.  Any real science involving the Top Six best evidences for ID would just be more science for Biblical creationists to deny.  None of the long time IDiots had ever been interested in believing in any ID science.  They had all been IDiots due to the failure of scientific creationism and the fact that they could not give up on the denial like MarkE.

The creationist obsession with Darwin is, I think, indicative of a deeper pathology: Creationists think science is essentially a sort of religion. Therefore, claims depend on the moral authority of those making them. Most creationists can't seem to wrap their brains around the idea that science neither respects nor requires moral authority. The character and habits of any given scientist are irrelevant; even if Charles Darwin had a side hustle burning down orphanages for fun and profit, it doesn't impact the veracity of evolutionary biology.
That's also why creationists whine and lie about "Darwinism" being "corrosive" for societies: "If evolution is true, then the nazis were right, only temporal power matters, and there is no Jesus to save us from an eternity in Hell!" Even if all that were true, it wouldn't make evolution any less factual. True things are true whether we like them or not. (See also: Denialism of other unhappy truths like climate change and structural racism.)
The only authority in science is the evidence, always and forever.
--
[The address listed is a spam trap. To reply, take off every zig.]
Kestrel Clayton
"Every normal woman must be tempted, at times, to stoke the fire,
host the black mass, and begin eating hearts." — Rose Bailey