Betenoire

Wondered if anybody had read the E/C discussion in this (er... last?) month's Skeptic. I scanned it briefly today, but didn't have the money on me to buy it. Is it worth the six bucks?

Toto

I have a copy, since I'm a member of the Skeptics Society, which is a good deal since I get a discount on admission to their meetings.

As for whether it's worth $6, it depends on what you are interested in. Skeptic is a quirky magazine that reflects the interests of Michael Shermer. There is a decent article on creationism and linguistics, showing aht creationists do bizarre and unscholarly things with linguistics. There is an article which characterizes Behe as promoting "microcreationism", that argues that microcreationism does not strengthen the case for macrocreationism (which is the main game), and that microcreationism does not weaken the case for macrocreationism, which I found interesting as an argument.

Then there is a survey of attitudes of Wiccans vs. creationists, finding that they are not the same, but I couldn't even finish it.

There is an article that I haven't read yet on a story about Isaac Newton that creationists like to use, which looks good.

And if you buy the issue, you also get Shermer's article on Bright Brouhaha and the search for a better name (which is on the web), plus a review by Tim Callahan of Elaine Pagel's Beyond Belief and a decent article on anti-Semitism and Jewish conpiracy theories (not quite as good as the recent Free Inquiry series.

pz

I subscribe, and second Toto's comments--it's quirky. I generally find it entertaining, though, and the educational/kids section at the back is good to pass around to the whole family.