Introducing Puck the Amazon Reviewer

Well, I can’t speak about events I wasn’t at. The event I described was attended by people whose main concern was science, and all the questions about the papers were about scientific matters. No questioner talked about God or the schools. I don’t deny what you say, but just wanted to make clear that not all gatherings of ID people are like what you experienced.

While there may have been a few such, those presenting and attending also included lots of young earth creationists (Sanford, Sewell, Oller, Brewer, Baumgardner, Gitt, etc), some theologians and apologists (Dembski, Durston, etc), an evangelistic zookeeper (Galloway) and several outright frauds (Abel, ReMine, Fernandez).

Because the conference organisers were trying to sucker Springer-Verlag into publishing the proceedings and explicitly asked the authors not to write about and the attendees not to discuss their religion.[1] Nevertheless, there was plenty of discussion of religion outside the presentation sessions.[2]

You know this, because you were there. Saying that all the papers and discussion concerned science[3] without mentioning that the organisers insisted presenters steer clear of religion is lying by omission.

[1] Confirmed not just by the below, but also here.

[2] As practiced by creationists

[3] As one of the other attendees wrote:
However, there was a great deal of fruitful private dialogue involving philosophical, theological, and teleological implications among presenters and attendees during our free time. The coordinators decision to eliminate any public religious content was understandable given their sincere commitment as a group to trace only the “science” evidence to its best and most logical conclusion

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Was that one of those times you guys rent a public conference room at a “highly prestigious university”, call it the [name of university]-conference, and then get together to take turns stating science-sounding reasons why you hate and reject biological evolution?

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Interesting that Eddie denies being associated with the DI yet constantly tells us he attends most all of their functions, speaks to their leading “science” authors on a regular basis, and can’t go two posts without repeating a discredited DI propaganda talking point.

Also interesting is there’s a minor DI Fellow whose biography fits very closely the academic background Eddie claims. I won’t name names but I’m sure it’s all a coincidence anyway. :slightly_smiling_face:

Come now. Eddie doesn’t tell lies. He told me that himself. There’s no way that Eddie would deny being associated with the DI if he was a DI Fellow.

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“Lying” is a provocative accusation which is uttered around here all too often. I notice that the atheists here use it frequently, the Christians not nearly as much. (Maybe atheists encounter lying much more within their social circles than Christians do, and so are more suspicious?) Anyhow, a news flash for you: in polite company, the word “lying” is used very sparingly, if ever.

As a matter of fact, I omitted nothing. Elsewhere here, in another discussion about the same conference, I mentioned that the organizers told everyone to discuss science and not religion.

Right – not during the question and answer sessions, which is what Puck and I were talking about.

The fact that you are eager to characterize a meeting you did not attend, and to try to reconstruct it using secondhand sources, and to reconstruct it in the most negative way, says something about your pre-existing biases.

Well, Behe gave a talk there, one which presupposed the reality of biological evolution. There were other speakers there who are on record as endorsing the reality of evolution. And a good number of the talks were about modeling evolutionary changes with computer software. The conference theme was “biological information” – and that was discussed from many different angles, both evolutionary and non-evolutionary.

In polite company, the word ‘lying’ is unnecessary. That it frequently gets used in reference to IDers says more about IDers than it does about the nature of the company.

That you mentioned it in another discussion just adds weight to the charge. You omitted that highly relevant detail here.

Those are not my words, I was quoting some-one else.

You said the event “was attended by people whose main concern was science”. Such people would neither need to be warned not to raise questions about religion, nor revert to theological discussions once that restriction was relaxed.

Secondhand sources”???

The accounts of attendees are firsthand sources. You ought to know the difference - unless you’re claiming that Galloway, Fernandez and Coppedge weren’t actually at the meeting?

Name three.

Why were you at that particular “science” conference?

One for certain is Scott Turner. I suspect he is not the only one, but I will drop the plural for the moment. In any case, Turner’s presence proves that Behe was not the only one there. And the main point is that no paper took on the tone of “hating and rejecting evolution” – which was the charge of Rumraket, who wasn’t there, any more than you were.

*footnote: I am not implying that Scott Turner is now or was then an ID proponent. In fact, at the time he did not agree with ID (and as far as I know still doesn’t). But he was at the conference, and read a paper. One doesn’t have to agree with ID to think that ID raises some interesting questions which impinge upon one’s own area research. Some biologists are thoughtful, rather than knee-jerk reactive toward anything non-mainstream.

I have legitimately not seen a sensible or coherent question raised from an ID proponent concerning biological evolution, that has not been raised by some evolutionary biologist already.

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I was invited.

Why? What did you have to offer in the area of biological information? Were any other Fellows of the DI invited and attended?

Maybe something and maybe nothing. There might be many reasons why a person was invited. I did not say that I presented a paper. (But then again, I did not say that I didn’t, so you’ll have to make your own guess.)

The obvious reason is because you’re associated with the DI. You certainly have memorized all their anti-science propaganda speeches and seem to attend all their functions. You wouldn’t happen to be a Fellow with their Center for Science and Culture now would you? :wink:

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Hardly.

I like to maintain a bit of mystery, so you’ll have to speculate.

Don’t worry, I won’t out you. But continuing to maintain you have no association with the DI is just ludicrous.

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“Association” is a vague word. Yes, I have “association” with many ID proponents with whom I correspond, and I also have “association” with Joshua through here and through private emails, and I have “association” with BioLogos as an adversary and long-time poster there, still being in touch with people there, and I have “association” with several Christian denominations to which I don’t belong, and with several universities where I’m not a permanent faculty member.

“Fellow” is not as vague. :wink: I completely understand why you don’t want to make your connection to the DI known.

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Drat! Exposed! (Not.) :smile: