#50013: Mark Trodden — 11/21  at  07:30 AM
I wonder how much money we might be able to raise with an appeal across the blogosphere?

#50019: — 11/21  at  08:20 AM
What's with the NYT and its habit of painting Creationists as sensible people with legitment concerns?

#50020: — 11/21  at  08:20 AM
Note also that one is an entire museum, while the other is an exhibit within a museum. I suspect that the corporations who declined to sponsor the exhibit did so not because they don't support evolution, but rather because they don't want the "bad" publicity sure to be generated by fundies because of it.

#50021: — 11/21  at  08:23 AM
Well that's the point. It's a shame that the fundies have gained so much influence that they can dictate who corporations can and cannot give money to.

#50022: coturnix — 11/21  at  08:32 AM
Any comment on this article?
http://www.townhall.com/opinion/columns/suzannefields/2005/11/21/176226.html

#50028: jfaberuiuc — 11/21  at  09:04 AM
Not to be overly contrarian, but I read the NYTimes review totally differently. Here's the quote in question:

Darwin was asserting that over the course of millenniums, miraculous bodily organs have taken shape out of prehistoric crudities, species have changed their characters and turned into completely different creatures, and human beings have come into existence, all because of accidental events and the brute forces of nature. Chance, in league with danger, created both the eye and the orchid, the ocelot and the man. Now imagine asserting these ideas when no one knew anything about genetic inheritance or mutation. Darwin’s digestive discomfort makes sense; in a way, so do contemporary discomforts with his work.

I took "miraculous" to refer to the view of man's organs from a 19th century perspective, where it is the appropriate adjective. If he was talking a twentieth century view, he qould have had to say "eons", not "millenniums" [sic]. As for gastro-intestinal distress, I thought he was implying that it was a side effect of evolution for those who don't know much about inheritance and mutation, i.e., that evolution is very troubling for the ignorant.

I am not sure if this is what the author meant, mind you, but if it is, then he actually did a very good job with his review, as far as I can tell.

#50030: — 11/21  at  09:16 AM
Good to see that even in The Telegraph (pretty right wing), the article makes the point that the argument is between science and fundamentalism and not some scientists vs. some other scientists.

#50044: Jen — 11/21  at  10:55 AM
I don't know if anyone's posted this before or mentioned it, but... Ham's "museum" was described in this article... which turned out to be a really cool article: http://gonesavage.blogsome.com/2005/11/11/greetings-from-idiot-america/

It descrbibes the Creation Museum as being part of "Idiot America" and describes what Idiot America is...

#50051: — 11/21  at  11:14 AM
Maybe they could hit up Bill Gates for a donation. He can afford it, and he needs to do some 'penance' for funding the Discovery Institute to the tune of $10 million (for a non-ID project).

#50067: — 11/21  at  12:21 PM

Maybe they could hit up Bill Gates for a donation. He can afford it, and he needs to do some 'penance' for funding the Discovery Institute to the tune of $10 million (for a non-ID project).

I had heard that Gates denoated money to the DI. I can't believe he did that! I didn't think Gates was religious and he always seemed to come off as a guy who was concerned about giving Americans quality science education. But what non-ID projects does the Discovery Institute do? Isn't it all about ID?

#50068: — 11/21  at  12:23 PM
I have mixed feelings about this. On the one hand, the reluctance to get involved with a project like this for fear of fundie backlash is deplorable. That said, as someone who works in a museum, I'm not convinced that corporate sponsorship of exhibits is necessarily a good thing. When I worked at the Field Museum, the Disney/McDonalds influence was so strong that there was a running joke about "working for Mouse and Clown."

Yes, museums are starving for funding (except the Getty). Yes, corporate sponsorship is a way to bring in money to do things that would otherwise be difficult or impossible. But it's a decidedly mixed blessing: using this case to construct a hypothetical, will museum reliance on corporate contributions to finance exhibitions eventually lead us to the point that no controversial material will be presented in order to avoid offending the sponsoring corporation's customer base? Very possibly, I'm afraid.

#50498: Raven — 11/23  at  07:59 PM
Too bad you're traveling today, PZ; I suspect you would have enjoyed Countdown.

SPOILER ALERT--don't read any more if you want to be surprised in your time zone.

The winners of Keith's Worst Person in the World today were the people behind the Intelligent Design movement, for putting the AMNH in the position of not being able to afford corporate funding. Good choice, Keith: Today's Worst Person in the World!