That’s true. But speaking from my own experience in the evolutionary creationist world, scientific critics have to choose battles when a large well funded organization in your community is pushing nonsense and invests resources in stifling criticism. I think that is what’s going on here, to even a greater extent.
I think many of these people are just a step or two away from a character in a Margaret Atwood novel.
So often we play into their game by just sticking to critiquing their science but science is pretty far from their ultimate agenda and seldom are they called out on that.
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I wouldn’t expect you to out them. I’m just saying their reluctance to say anything too negative about him speaks volumes to me what this is really about, and it’s certainly not science
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They were not reluctant to say negative things. They were very quick and voluminous.
I do get the sense they are david squaring off against the AIG giant. There are significant costs to them in making public criticism, because of how AIG will respond.
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That’s a part of what I’m getting at. A lot of this is about power and control.
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You get these individuals rising to power in the framework of a fundamentalist religion and they can hold on to that power by essentially declaring any dissenters apostates. Couple that with the economic competition between these groups and you get silence from fear of economic ruin for your ministry and fear of being shunned by their religious community. There are a lot of parallels with the FLDS, Hasidic Judaism, and other fundamentalist groups.
Let’s not forget that many of these creationist groups might seem like these harmless cranks but they are using science to chip away at secular society so they can gain more power and influence and start inserting their religious views into public life. I think we get so bogged down with them in arguing about trees and mutation rates we forget that.
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You know what I mean. In public. I’m sure they were happy to bad mouth him in private. I suspect they’ve all been doing that for as long as there’s been creationism. It’s in one sense a business and they are competing for customers.
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So what? It’s not working.
There are school systems today in the United States either teaching creationism or downplaying evolution right now. Just follow the NCSE to see where this is happening.
My own son’s public school system held an evangelical revival during the school day which my son and another friend of his who is Jewish as well as other students were forced to attend. During this revival they were told they had to accept Jesus or would burn in hell. A similar revival was held the same week by the same pastor in a public middle school in our community and there too students were forced to attend.
Another public school district here in WV was holding Bible classes in elementary school until recently and only stopped because they lost a suit filed by the Freedom from Religion foundation.
Then there is where we are headed in terms of any number of culture war issues such as abortion, contraception, transgender rights, and gay marriage to name a few.
They may not be winning in large urban centers but for much of the country religious fundamentalism does wield disproportionate and undue power in many communities. And the point is that the science is a means for organizations like AiG to enter into these culture war issues. You can’t just ignore their agenda and science really is not the primary goal.
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Rob Carter recently commented on a paper, and the critiques seems to apply to Jeanson’s work in notably specific ways. Interestingly, he’s one of the people who definitely “cites” Jeanson’s work, for example in the “Dismantled” documentary, when it comes to using pedigree mutation rates to calculate the timing of mt-MRCA. But in terms of the Traced argument specifically, reading between the lines, Carter is not buying it.
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I wouldn’t be surprised if he just doesn’t like him personally. Given all the nonsense that someone like Carter believes I’m not sure why he wouldn’t also buy what Jeanson is selling.
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The argument in Traced really jumps the shark. Even if one is with Jeanson on the mtEve work, Traced really is unbelievable in new ways. So I wouldn’t be surprised if Carter gives Nathaniel a split decision.
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The way I see it creationism has never met a shark it wouldn’t jump.
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Is there any part that isn’t?
You might feel differently if you had been impregnated by a rapist and were seeking an abortion in Texas.
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It’s ironic that fellow creationists don’t want to go public with criticism of Traced.
I don’t think it is going too far to suggest that Ken Ham’s personal credibility is at stake. He, of ‘the “Rosetta Stone” of Human History’, would be loath to admit to a mistake under any circumstances let alone a monumental error such as this. OTOH, the First Law of holes must surely apply.
It will be interesting to see whether/how AIG responds/reacts, and the effect on critics.
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Because I value quality science education, I am glad I live in New England.
The challenge is that creationist “science” does not need to create a cohesive theory, because they are not trying to convince actual scientists, they are trying to appeal to lay people who do know enough science to see the flaws in their arguments. It is rather easy to win by with catchy sound-bites that create distrust in science generally, in such a way that people cannot easily see the flaws in the arguments. My concern is that setting up that culture of doubt in science eventually leads some people to also distrust medical science generally, as we saw this past year with people declining vaccines that could have protected themselves and their families.
The other big issue is that AiG also does bad theology, and average people tend not to notice that either.
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In my country (Nigeria) its way worse. Creationism (from all sorts of gods including the Christian one) reigns supreme here. Each time I bring up the topic of evolution, I almost always get branded as an atheist until I point out there are lots of Christians who accept evolution. Almost always, the person raises up the issue of Adam and Eve and that’s where I shove GAE (written by a Christian and scientist) in their faces showing how we can be descendants of A&E and ancestral apes at the same time.
In virtually all Nigerian schools, religious prayers are held before activities begin and everyone must attend regardless of faith (or faithlessness).
LOL, good luck to anyone trying to sue schools to end this in my country.
So…you guys are admitting that Jeanson is correct about the mutation rate? You just think it’s wrong to use it as a substitution rate, essentially assuming selection is negligible. Wow.
Maybe YECs should be allowed to participate and publish in the real scientific community and receive real scientific funding then. If science is self-correcting, then allowing that would be best for all involved, would it not?
Incredible that people still don’t understand the critique. When Jeanson cites authors like Parsons or Ding to get a pedigree mutation rate, I’m not arguing that that rate is the problem (in Traced, the rate is a problem, but that’s hasnt been the focus on my critiques). It’s the use of that rate to extrapolate a strict molecular clock backwards in time that is invalid.
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There isn’t a conspiracy against YECs. Nobody’s stopping Jeanson or anyone else from submitting their work the real journals. They just don’t do it.
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