PZ Myers. 2005 May 23. A jackass sans mortarboard. <http://pharyngula.org/index/weblog/a_jackass_sans_mortarboard/>. Accessed 2008 Nov 20.

Posted on M00o93H7pQ09L8X1t49cHY01Z5j4TT91fGfr on Monday, May 23, 2005

A jackass sans mortarboard

One has to be amused. A right-wing maroon named J. Bowen is incensed that one of my co-conspirators at the Panda's Thumb used insulting invective…which he addresses, ironically enough, in this way:

If you should ever see a jackass wearing a mortarboard exiting a biology department, it might well answer to the name "Hoppe". From a post attacking someone who dares to dissent from evolutionary dogma, quoth Richard Hoppe:

What a fine example of IOKIYAR! Of course, since I know two fine Hoppes—the above mentioned Richard, and another who is a colleague in the UMM biology discipline—I have a rather different impression of the name.

What's got poor Mr Bowen all worked up? That Richard Hoppe had critized…William D. Rubinstein! You recall him: the outrageously clueless wanker historian who went on and on with genuinely stupid complaints about evolutionary theory. Both Hoppe and I have done more than insult him—we've vivisected his poor arguments with links to easily accessible refutations. I guess Bowen noticed that Rubinstein was smarter than he was, so all our put-downs of a certain Welsh historian also applied with even more force to him.

Bowen has nothing of substance to say, but he does manage to pull of a lovely example of egregious creationist quote mining. In this case, Bowen quotes five paragraphs from a speciation FAQ at the talk.origins archive…the five paragraphs that discuss the relatively sparse documentation of speciation events in the scientific literature. From this he concludes:

I guess you can't help but admire the faith of these biologists in things not actually observed. Sorry, but these inferences of speciation events simply aren't any more scientific than inferences of creation events.

One strange thing is that he doesn't actually bother to link to the FAQ containing those five cautionary paragraphs. If he had, the reader could have looked beyond them to notice that the author goes on to list about 30 observations of the speciation process. And there's a link to another FAQ with a couple more. I guess by neglecting to link and only quoting the bits he likes, he can claim that speciation is "not actually observed".

He also doesn't seem to understand the word "inference". Inference is a valid and reasonable technique based on evidence. When you observe two similar but distinct species separated by an isolation mechanism (for instance, the Kaibab and Abert squirrels, populations split apart by the Grand Canyon), speciation by natural, documented mechanisms is a perfectly reasonable inference drawn from the observation. Assuming that an invisible super-being zapped them into existence exactly as they are is not an inference—it's more of a wild-assed brain fart—since the conclusion has no flanking evidence to give it reasonable credibility.

Bowen is obviously familiar enough with the talk.origins archive to cite it, but he's not smart enough to comprehend it. It consists of pages and pages of solid evidence, yet he somehow comes away with the impression that all it contains is apologies for missing pieces of the story.

Let the crying begin: Some of the fossils are gone! We haven't found them all yet! Many of the species have soft bodies and are not adequately preserved in the fossil record! Evolutionary processes take a long time! And so on. The answer to them all is tough luck, kid - the evidence is supposed to be there to support your theory.

Here ya go, kid: evidence. Although I suspect Bowen actually knows its there…he's just doing his damnedest to give the impression there isn't any supporting evidence. It's hard to say, though. Creationists tread a fine line between stupidity and dishonesty, sometimes.

Posted by PZ Myers on 05/23 at 08:06 AM
Creationism • 1 Trackbacks • Other weblogs • Permalink
  1. Typo: Abert squirrels, not Albert. Minutia to be sure, but I just spent a few days chasing them away from my backpack.
    #: Posted by Chris Clarke  on  05/23  at  08:16 AM
  2. Dang. And I'd even linked right to a picture of Sciurus aberti. It's a hard word to type without one's right ring finger making a reflexive twitch.
    #: Posted by PZ Myers  on  05/23  at  08:23 AM
  3. Doesn't it seem odd that religious people would use an argument requiring something to be observed? I guess they don't note the irony.
    #: Posted by Thomas Wilburn  on  05/23  at  08:23 AM
  4. In an earlier article in "Social Affairs.." Rubinstein criticized amateur historians for using secondary sources. His standards for science are remarkably different. Apparently neither he nor Bowen believe that amateur scientists need to accurately comprehend secondary sources.

    Is this a failure to generalize or is it a belief that science, as opposed to history, is mere speculation?
    #: Posted by Les Lane  on  05/23  at  08:51 AM
  5. "Creationists tread a fine line between stupidity and dishonesty, sometimes."

    It seems like many in the public sphere are treading this line. They're learning how from the White House, I'm afraid.
    #: Posted by buzz  on  05/23  at  09:14 AM
  6. The only Hoppe I know is super hot, so my associations to the name are VERY positive, though in a different way... wink
    #: Posted by coturnix  on  05/23  at  10:18 AM
  7. Maybe that's just a parody of a creationist rant. You know that it's impossible to tell the difference, don't you?
    #: Posted by  on  05/23  at  10:51 AM
  8. I always thought lying was supposed to be one of them "sin" things.
    #: Posted by craig  on  05/23  at  01:11 PM
  9. coturnix wrote
    The only Hoppe I know is super hot, so my associations to the name are VERY positive, though in a different way... wink
    Oh, you know my sisters, do you? smile

    RBH
    #: Posted by  on  05/23  at  01:52 PM
  10. RBH: Perhaps...where do you live?
    #: Posted by coturnix  on  05/23  at  02:29 PM
  11. Well craig. In my experience commantments are provisional. They are followed, but only so long as they don't interfer with "spreading the truth." or other similar nonsense. Frankly, as I have said in other places, I would not be at all suprised if they allowed adultery in special cases. What do you think? Making gay people sleep with married people = cures homosexuality? lol Seems reasonable religious logic to me. ;)
    #: Posted by  on  05/23  at  03:49 PM
  12. An unrelated story, WingNutDaily columnist Vox Day has this post on his blog where he quotes Richard Lewontin (Day got the quote from another WingNutDaily columnist).

    Day then ends the post by mentioning the Panda’s Thumb:

    I’ll be interested to know how the Panda’s Thumb apologists attempt to explain that one away, given that it cuts the legs out from under their insistence on the impartiality of science and supports every doubt that evolutionary skeptics have had about evolutionary apologists for decades.
    #: Posted by  on  05/23  at  04:51 PM
  13. In British English, "wanker" is actually a very strong term - on the level of, say, "d*ckhead" - and is usually considered to be swearing. It's also still quite sexualised, unlike the American "jerk". I've no objection to seeing Rubenstein so described, but I thought maybe you should know (I was surprised to see the word pop up in an episode of Friends, so I figured it is probably weaker in US English), since Rubenstein is based in Wales.

    There is another great British insult, "berk", which is milder and on the same level as the US "jerk". But that's only because most people don't know its origin (rhyming slang "Berkeley Hunt").

    I'd probably just call Rubenstein a "plonker".
    #: Posted by Bartholomew  on  05/23  at  05:58 PM
  14. Jason:

    Why am I not surprised that Vox Day is an ID apologist? wink
    #: Posted by Orac  on  05/23  at  09:07 PM
  15. Ah, J. Bowen - I had a run-in with him some time ago over, I believe, public breastfedding and how the sight of a woman's booby providing nourishment made him have naughty thoughts, thus it was the woman's fault and why can't she just keep her tits in her burqa for God's sake?

    Good to see he's still a reasonable sort.
    #: Posted by andy  on  05/24  at  08:04 AM
  16. Bartholomew: I'm in the UK, and having read Rubinstein's post and his "response" to the criticism, I can assure you he's a wanker. It's particularly suitable since historians are renowned for refusing to make firm statements on anything outside "their period", yet here he is pontificating in a superior manner on something he admits to having only a "desultory interest" in. Classic wanker behaviour.
    #: Posted by  on  05/24  at  09:31 AM