Quote:I'll let you in on a secret, I do stupid things once in awhile. Luckily for me, my boss and peers don't persecute me for my mistakes, and vice-versa. We find it is more productive to work together on stuff, and help each other get things done rather than tear each other down. I really don't think Sternberg thought it would be anything more than controversial. He was wrong, and now he has been given his scarlet letter.
Wow, wouldn't it be nice if we could all just get along, and work with such competitive collaborators as Dr. Meyer towards a better understanding of science. After all, he's just out to understand ideas in greater depth, with better evidence, right?
Uh, no.
http://www.antievolution.org/features/wedge.pdf
Their goal is the total replacement of naturalism, in both science and culture, with a creationist, theistic understanding of the world. This is not a scientific agenda, this is an anti-science dogma. This is the man who wrote that paper, Steven C. Meyer. This is what Sternberg decided to let in through the back door, granting ID its first (and to date, only) peer-reviewed paper. Bollocks to him saying he did it by the books, because nobody except the DI backs up his story. The journal has retracted the article and claims it would never have seen the light of day, were the proper reviewers consulted. He abused his position to do what would otherwise have been possible only through a career-ending error: putting anti-scientific drivel in a peer-reviewed journal.
Meyer, and his team at the Discovery Institute, are not pursuing a collaborative research agenda. Not only do they have nothing to contribute in terms of useful evidence or theory, but they have no interest in the other half of the debate being possibly correct. They have a faith-based position that is antithetical not only to evolution, but to scientific naturalism itself.
This junk deserves the reception it has gotten, and if it is not fair to persecute a scientist on the basis of their religion, it is hardly strange (let alone illegal) that their careers would be ended by offering support to "science" that is on the level of Hypercube or Reflexology.
Quote:Edit: BTW, I also saw the stuff on Sternberg's earlier associations. There is little evidence I can see of his support anywhere for actual ID, although he might have been sympathetic to notions of irreducibly complex structures.
He was on a Baraminology study group editorial board. No biologist who wasn't at least mildly supportive of ID would touch that with a 50 foot pole.
He delivered a paper at this conference, along with nearly every other luminary of the ID movement: http://www.iscid.org/rapid/schedule.html
He signed the Discovery Institute's facetious "Dissent from Darwinism" statement.
Forgive me if I don't find that to be "little evidence" of support for "actual ID". Sounds to me like he was up to his ears in it, if not as a 100% true believer, then at least as a very supportive fellow traveller. You don't give papers at the "Research and Progress in Intelligent Design" conference otherwise.
-Jester
Edit: Changed "subscribing" to "offering support" to better reflect what is known for certain about Sternberg's actions.
Afterthought: As to what is SETI relative to Intelligent Design, why not ask SETI? http://www.space.com/searchforlife/seti_in...ign_051201.html