Apparently William Dembski, over at Uncommon Descent is *not* happy with my review of
Behe’s new book. He pulls out a rather pathetic bit of faux outrage: “Are there any anti-ID writings that the Panda’s Thumb won’t endorse?”
The outrage really comes off badly. But what’s Debski and his trained attack dog DaveScott try to smear me for my alleged lack of adequate credentials to judge the math of Behe’s argument.

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I’ve gotten my hands on a review copy of Michael Behe’s new book, “The Edge of Evolution”. The shortest version of a review is: Bad science, bad math, and bad theology, all wrapped up in a pretty little package.
As people who’ve followed his writings, lectures, and court appearances know, Behe is pretty much a perfect example of the ignoramus who makes a bad argument, and then puts his fingers in his ears and shouts “La la la, I can’t hear you” whenever anyone refutes it. He *still* harps on his “irreducible complexity” nonsense, despite the fact that pretty much *every aspect* of it has been thoroughly refuted. (The entire concept of IC is a pile of rubbish; the entire argument about IC is based on the idea that evolution is a strictly additive process, which is not true; there are numerous examples of observed evolution of IC systems, both in biology and in evolutionary algorithms. But none of these facts makes a bit of difference: like the energizer bunny of ignorance, he just keeps going, and going…)
Anyway, the new book is based on what comes down to a mathematical argument – a mathematical argument that I’ve specifically refuted on this blog numerous times. I’m not mentioning that because I expect Behe to read GM/BM and consider it as a serious source for his research; even if I were an expert in the subject (which I’m *not*), a blog is *not* a citable source for real research. But I mention it because the error is so simple, so fundamental, and so bleeding *obvious* that even a non-expert can explain what’s wrong with it in a spare five minutes – but Behe, who apparently spent several *years* writing this book still can’t see the problem. (In fact, one of the papers that he cites as *support* for this ridiculous theory contains the refutation!)

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I debated about whether or not I should write this post. But as you can see, in the
end, I overcame my better judgement, and so he we are.

Over the weekend, PZ wrote a Pharyngula post about the reaction people have had to Mitt
Romney’s statement about evolution. He was pissed. And I agree with his initial reaction.
What we have is a politician basically saying “Yes, I agree with the facts”. And somehow,
that’s been taken by a seemingly huge number of people as something brave and bold,
something that should impress us. Nope, sorry folks: acknowledging that facts are facts is
not brave. I’m no more impressed with him for saying that evolution is true than
I’d be if he got up and said “I admit it: I believe that 2+2=4.”

But typically, when discussing anything that involves religion, PZ went overboard. And
it ticked me off.

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This isn’t math, but I felt like commenting anyway. That shining example of
an Intelligent Design advocate, Dr. Michael Egnor, is back once again. And this time,
his point, such as it is, is to basically fling insults at PZ Myers. What did PZ do to bring on his ire?

Well, PZ was annoyed with Time magazine, because for their “Time 100” list, they
had Michael Behe write the entry about Richard Dawkins. The passage which Engor took such offense at was the following:

The incompetence is stunning. Richard Dawkins makes the Time 100 list, and who do they commission to write up his profile?

Michael F**king Behe.

That’s not just stupid, it’s a slap in the face. It would have been no problem to find a smart biologist, even one who might be critical of Dawkins’ message, to write something that expressed some measure of respect from the editorial staff. But to dig up a pseudoscientific fraud whose sole claim to fame is that he has led the charge to corrupt American science education for over a decade is shameful.

Now, what’s wrong with PZ’s reaction, according to Egnor?

One word.

Yes. PZ used the word “Fucking” to refer to Behe.

I added the asterisks. Both Behe and Myers are college biology professors who teach young biologists and biochemists the methods of scientific inquiry and, by example, teach students the appropriate standards of scientific discourse.

Which professor is shamefully corrupting American science education?

Yup. That’s it. It’s the one word. In the mind of Michael Egnor, throwing off a nasty word in the heat of the moment is a grave offense, far worse than spending more than a decade as a professional liar, far worse an offense for a scientist than, say, pretending to know the content of several dozen papers that you’ve never read.

Now, I’m not exactly PZs biggest fan. I think he’s abrasive and arrogant. But I also know, from the experience of reading his writings, that he’s an intelligent, passionate advocate for science; he’s a teacher who works hard at teaching his students real science, critical thinking, and the scientific method.

And I agree with him about the incredible stupidity of asking Behe to write the piece on Dawkins. Behe is not a legitimate scientist. Behe is a dreadful hack who’s spent most of the last two decades hard at work on a program to deliberately and dishonestly misrepresent science as part of a political agenda. He’s been caught lying repeatedly; his ideas, such as they are, have been discredited. He even made an ass of himself in the Kitmiller trial, by handwaving away a stack of papers that he’d never seen before, because even without reading them, he just knew that they contained
nothing of any relevance. Choosing him to write a profile of Richard Dawkins is just plain offensive. It’s sort of like asking PZ to write a profile about the Pope’s influence as a theologist.

So, Dr. Egnor. Which professor is shamefully corrupting American science education? The professor who is a passionate (if arrogant) teacher of real science? Or the dishonest (and arrogant) professor who is an advocate of introducing misrepresentations into the science curriculum in order to discredit scientific theories that disagree with his religious beliefs?

Let’s try looking at one other little quote, which I think is pretty illustrative of the difference between the two as educators. PZ is a tireless advocate for the teaching of real science to all science students. Behe, on the other hand, at the end of his interview with the director of the movie “Flock of Dodos”, said “Why should I care what gets taught in public school? My kids don’t go to public schools.”

Who’s the teacher who really cares about science education? And who’s the one corrupting it? Look at the facts, and it’s pretty obvious.

Of course, Dr. Egnor won’t do that. Because as he’s demonstrated in the past, he
doesn’t need to waste his time looking at petty little things like facts, because he already knows the truth. Just like Professor Behe.

An astute reader pointed me towards a monstrosity of pompous bogus math. It’s an oldie, but I hadn’t seen it before, and it was just referenced by my old buddy Sal Cordova in a thread on one of the DI blogs. It’s a “debate” posted online by Lee Spetner, in which he rehashes the typical bogus arguments against evolution. I’m going to ignore most of it; this kind of stuff has been refuted more than enough times. But in the course
of this train wreck, he pretends to be making a mathematical argument about search spaces and optimization processes. It’s a completely invalid argument – but it’s one which is constantly rehashed by creationists, and Spetner’s version of it is a perfect demonstration of exactly what’s wrong with the argument.

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