Pharyngula::Ooo, that has gotta sting

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Tuesday, August 30, 2005

Ooo, that has gotta sting

PZ Myers • 33 Comments (last page)

Michael Behe, author of Darwin's Black Box, is probably the most scientifically respectable proponent of Intelligent Design creationism out there, despite the fact that he has no scientific basis for his beliefs in unevidenced magical interventions in the history of life on Earth. He's also a professor at Lehigh University in Pennsylvania, which makes this statement from the Lehigh Department of Biological Sciences particularly juicy.

Department Position on Evolution and "Intelligent Design"
The faculty in the Department of Biological Sciences is committed to the highest standards of scientific integrity and academic function. This commitment carries with it unwavering support for academic freedom and the free exchange of ideas. It also demands the utmost respect for the scientific method, integrity in the conduct of research, and recognition that the validity of any scientific model comes only as a result of rational hypothesis testing, sound experimentation, and findings that can be replicated by others.

The department faculty, then, are unequivocal in their support of evolutionary theory, which has its roots in the seminal work of Charles Darwin and has been supported by findings accumulated over 140 years. The sole dissenter from this position, Prof. Michael Behe, is a well-known proponent of “intelligent design.” While we respect Prof. Behe's right to express his views, they are his alone and are in no way endorsed by the department. It is our collective position that intelligent design has no basis in science, has not been tested experimentally, and should not be regarded as scientific.

Behe's faculty page also mentions this:

My ideas about irreducible complexity and intelligent design are entirely my own. They certainly are not in any sense endorsed by either Lehigh University in general or the Department of Biological Sciences in particular. In fact, most of my colleagues in the Department strongly disagree with them.

Behe's academic freedom is fully supported by his department, but this is a loud vote of no confidence in his work. That sounds like an unpleasantly uncomfortable environment to be in.

That Ken Miller has been invited to speak at Lehigh is the cherry on top. Will any of you Eastern Pennsylvanians be attending on 12 October? It should be interesting, especially if Behe is in the audience.

(via Red State Rabble)

Trackback url: http://pharyngula.org/index/trackback/2818/dwHZgB9D/

Comments:

#38112: — 08/30 at 02:38 PM
Hopefully Behe is not stoopid enough to complain of "vicious attacks" and "intimidation" and a "hostile work environment" as Guillermo Gonzalez is doing at Iowa State. Behe's probably too busy counting the money he'll be getting from his next IDC book.

#38115: Christopher Mason — 08/30 at 02:44 PM
Let the quack of the department be known as such... a quack.
Let his webbed feet splash his stupidity no further than the consensus-based, hermetically sealed walls of his own peers.

#38120: — 08/30 at 02:58 PM
What is the usual way to rid a university of a tenured professor who has become, shall we say, an embarassment to the institution? Or is lying and otherwise misrepresenting one's very profession o.k. as long as it's for Jeebus?

#38122: — 08/30 at 03:03 PM

What is the usual way to rid a university of a tenured professor who has become, shall we say, an embarassment to the institution?

There is no way. That's what 'tenure' is.

By the way, this is really remarkable. This is the first case I've ever seen where a whole department came out to disassociate itself from a faculty member, in public, on its official web page. That's a big snub. Generally when a tenured professor becomes a horrible embarrassment, they try very hard to pretend he doesn't exist.

#38123: Dennis — 08/30 at 03:05 PM
I find it especially interesting that of the 11 articles listed in the "selected publications" portion of his faculty page, only one appears to be an actual scientific paper published in a peer-reviewed journal.

#38124: — 08/30 at 03:13 PM
Ken Miller will make Behe look like a fool. I had Miller for introductory biology 10 years ago, and he's not just a smart guy, but he's a great speaker who can really break down hard concepts and make them understandable.

Also, he's good looking and funny. Not a bad spokesman for the side of honest science.

#38125: PZ Myers — 08/30 at 03:14 PM
That's what 'academic freedom' is. It wouldn't be very free if we tried to boot out faculty who hold unpopular views.

I also fully support Behe's privilege of being unorthodox and wrong.

PZ Myers
Division of Science and Math
University of Minnesota, Morris

#38126: — 08/30 at 03:24 PM
I've seen a few professors who have more or less lost it well after tenure. It's true the lengths to which other professors will go to ignore them during talks and department tea. At least he didn't win a Nobel first like Brian Josepheson and write about quantum mechanics and telepathy, forcing the whole community to have to issue a disclaimer.

#38127: — 08/30 at 03:50 PM

There is no way. That's what 'tenure' is.

Well, there is a way, but it is pretty unorthodox and probably illegal. It involves sleeping pills, nude co-eds, and a camera. It will depend on the code of conduct of the particular institution, frequently they throw in a paragraph about 'moral turpitude' just in case they ever need to go to this length.

Seriously, it's difficult. At my undergrad institution, a professor of engineering was a holocaust denier. Apparently he was a perfectly adequate professor of engineering, they never got rid of him while I was there.

#38130: Zeno — 08/30 at 04:17 PM

There is no way. That's what 'tenure' is.

As someone who benefits from tenure, perhaps I should not correct a common misapprehension that only makes tenure stronger. In the interests of honesty, however, I feel that I must point out that "tenure" does not mean "lifetime employment no matter what". It means that a tenured faculty member cannot be dismissed except for "cause", where "cause" may vary from place to place but never includes matters of academic freedom. (Okay, mayby nothing is quite so cut and dried as that, but it's close enough for academic work.)

In my humble institution, only a couple of faculty members have run afoul of what constitutes "just cause" for their dismissal. One had gotten into delivering racist and sexist rants that escalated to the point where more students were in the admin building filing complaints than in his classroom yelling back at him (or cowering behind their desks). Another was given to informing his female colleagues and department staff workers that he was "available" to service their physical needs. Strictly speaking, he was not dismissed, but he was banned from our campus and sent to another colleage in the same district with an appointment contingent on "good behavior", which he has not since violated. I feel sorry for our colleagues at our sister college who ended up with him, but his dismissal from our campus thoroughly "outed" his harrassment and put him under constant scrutiny in his new position.

Tenure's not perfect, but I like it better than the alternative of kissing up to academic management.

#38132: Sean — 08/30 at 04:30 PM
"Magical interventions" is a nice phrase. I'll have to use that more often.

#38134: — 08/30 at 05:05 PM
"Freedom is when it's safe to be unpopular".

#38135: — 08/30 at 05:06 PM
I just got back from today's session of the American Chemical Society's national meeting. I was attending the A. C. Cope Scholar Awards ceremony, and one of the speakers was Rustem Ismagilov. His lecture was on a physical-organic approach to complex reaction systems, and, as you can see from the link, he's been modeling hemostasis. That hemostasis is "irreducibly complex" is one of Behe's central dogmata. Ismagilov went out of his way to point out that the essential features of hemostasis could be modeled by a system of no more than three chemical reactions, and that the notion of its irreducible complexity was absurd.

I felt like standing up and cheering.

Trackback: Continuing the Evolution meme Tracked on: A Concerned Scientist (72.9.234.70) at 2005 08 30 17:10:41
Today's links in the Evolution vs. Un-Intelligent design debate:

#38136: — 08/30 at 05:16 PM
I believe that refusal to teach can be used to revoke tenure as well.

#38137: — 08/30 at 05:45 PM
I worked at one medical school where even refusal to teach was not grounds for dismissal. (I, not a physician, was not covered by such a glorious insurance policy.) One of the faculty told me that, theoretically, it was possible for him to go home and not show up again and still collect his salary. He could simply claim he was writing a book. As a practical matter, this was not going to happen. He had far too much invested in his work and career to just walk away from it. Not to mention the fact that he was having a heck of a lot of fun as a faculty member.

#38138: Bill Tozier — 08/30 at 05:49 PM
The department has, in effect, called "bullshit". Which is valid science.

Trackback: Irreducible Differences Tracked on: Newton's Binomium (72.9.234.70) at 2005 08 30 17:50:14
Michael Behe, one of the few credible research scientists to defend intelligent design creationism, has just been disowned by his own department at Lehigh University

#38140: Orac — 08/30 at 05:55 PM
Heh. LeHigh's only around 60-70 miles away...

--
Orac “A statement of fact cannot be insolent.”
http://oracknows.blogspot.com

#38141: Bill — 08/30 at 06:01 PM
I can only imagine that like Iowa State, Lehigh didn't want to be known as IDU.

So, let's summarize:

Dembski is parked by Baylor for 4 years.
Behe is disavowed by his own department at Lehigh.
Gonzalez is exposed by Iowa State.

It is ironic that the chief "scientists" of "intelligent design" are thwarted by their collective inability to perform any science. Unfortunately for them, the miracle they seek could not be conjured even by Harry Potter.

However, they all show an aptitude for Science Fiction. Perhaps a second career is in the offing...

#38144: — 08/30 at 06:22 PM
Puh-leeze -- science fiction is a respectable calling.

Trackback: There is no debate Tracked on: c u l t u r e k i t c h e n (66.240.178.101) at 2005 08 30 18:27:10
Well, our favorite fussy fuckwit returns to tell me how flawed my character is (a question I'll leave to people who actually know me), as well as to continue his obfuscation. I think some of our commenters make an error in asking Gibbons to comment on actual science--or even the...

#38145: — 08/30 at 06:29 PM
As a Lehigh alumn of Geoscience Department and only 20 minutes away I hope to attend.

#38146: PZ Myers — 08/30 at 06:35 PM
What is it with all of these Lehigh geologists? We've got two of them here at UMM!

PZ Myers
Division of Science and Math
University of Minnesota, Morris

#38149: — 08/30 at 06:45 PM

As someone who benefits from tenure, perhaps I should not correct a common misapprehension that only makes tenure stronger. In the interests of honesty, however, I feel that I must point out that "tenure" does not mean "lifetime employment no matter what". It means that a tenured faculty member cannot be dismissed except for "cause", where "cause" may vary from place to place but never includes matters of academic freedom. (Okay, mayby nothing is quite so cut and dried as that, but it's close enough for academic work.)

I'm sorry if my remarks were interpreted as indicating that I oppose the concept of tenure -- I don't. I basically just meant that tenure means that professors cannot have their tenure stripped away for mere unorthodoxy. Tenure unavoidably ends up protecting people whose unorthodoxy advances science and those whose unorthodoxy is mere idiocy. It's the price we have to pay to secure academic freedom for good scholars.

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Tuesday, August 30, 2005

Ooo, that has gotta sting

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