pangloss

Oour old pal and self-professed scientific illiterate 'mturner' has posted a dandy at ARN. It says, in part:

"Yet Darwinists have the gall to demand that ID have a perfect explanatory, testable, mechanism for the generation of novelty, that is, evolution, where their, "Natural Selection", has none whatsoever. Well, as a matter of fact we do. I call it EAM."

<a href="http://www.arn.org/ubb/ultimatebb.php?ubb=get_topic;f=13;t=000459" target="_blank">http://www.arn.org/ubb/ultimatebb.php?ubb=get_topic;f=13;t=000459</a>

This is amazing. mturner posted this today (11/15), yet curiously has ignored a post from 2 days ago, titled "EAM is dead?"

<a href="http://www.arn.org/ubb/ultimatebb.php?ubb=get_topic;f=13;t=000458" target="_blank">http://www.arn.org/ubb/ultimatebb.php?ubb=get_topic;f=13;t=000458</a>

indicating that one of the basic tenets of mturner's 'deny the facts' fantasy, "direwcted mutation", does not exist...

Bubba

ARN reminds me of an old car I found in an old junkyard once. It was a 1957 Cadillac convertible, and really complete. Thinking I'd found a restoration candidate, I got excited. However, rust had made the damn thing so brittle that no matter where you tried to grab ahold of the car it crumbled in your hand.

ID seems to be the same. Every time I try to find one solid part of it it seems to crumble to dust upon close inspection. I can't seem to find a single poster at ARN who seems to be thinking clearly about anything.

Bubba

Principia

Actually, there is some truth to this, in my view. Recently, several ID critics left ARN out of frustration with the evasive and arrogant ID proponents. My question is what the hell are the remaining critics doing there? Let's take a look at the remaining ID proponents who have been active in the past month or so: Mike Gene, jazzraptor, RFH, PLA, Douglas (!), nobody, leonard, Leo, bones, mb, Mr. Smartest Man in America, and his groupie girlfriend. There are really two groups there: 1) those who have been there practically since the start of ARN and are still regurgitating the same party lines; or 2) Creationists who are there for some cultural war. In any case, has the discussion at ARN ever progressed beyond ill-tempered shouting matches?

I think the problem here is that the ID critics at ARN have succeeded in lending credence to the notion that there is in fact a 'controversy.' They go over, spar with the Creationists, get painted as 'steretypers' and 'oppressive materialist academics' and what not. And yet they keep ticking. All for what?

If the goal is to impress the lurkers of the merits of evolution vs. Creationism/ID, I think the best course of action is to boycott sites like ARN and ISCID, where the moderation is designed specifically to play to public sentiments and where moderators get to be as inflammatory as they can with impunity (e.g. John Bracht and Jack Foster). Let them get what they desperately need -- which for most of them is a lot of testimonials and witnessing and self-promoting arm-chair philosophy that is unimpeded by critics. I just don't see the point anymore of directly confronting these IDiots, when they shoot themselves in their collective foot more often than not. Will someone give me a good reason?

Any way, my two cents.

[ November 15, 2002: Message edited by: Principia ]</p>

Douglas J. Bender

And whose fault would [i]that[i] be (if it was true), Mr. "I'm-So-Smart-Because-I-Went-To-A-School-Where-Lots-Of-Other-People-Did-Reasonably-Well-On-A-National-Mathematics-Exam"? Would you like to be reminded of some of your quotes which show that your primary motive in previously posting over there was to instigate shouting matches, and to "fan the flames"? Or would you like to explain why you were oh-so-unjustly banned from ARN, TWICE (under two different names)?

And in what way would that be any different from what goes on here at Infidels? Would you be willing to hold up ARN to Infidels, and compare which board has more civil and reasoned discussions, and which has a higher percentage of "shouting matches"? No?

Do you realize that Creationists and IDists generally view those who hold to evolution in about the same way that you present IDists and Creationists - incapable of rational thought on the issues (though few would go so far as to call evolutionists "idiots", though they might think this in many cases)? Do you realize you sound rather irrational and unscientific to be so clearly antagonistic to IDists and Creationists, and that you, and those who exhibit such harsh and emotional reactions to them, give the impression of being incapable of objectively analyzing the issues? Probably not, but I thought I'd ask anyway.


In Christ,

Douglas

Principia

And, since the above poster is what most of us would expect from ARN, I happily rest my case.

Xeluan

Is it just me or has a certain mod over at ARN really going after the ID critics?

Xeluan

Principia

Yeah, I noticed the defense mechanisms really shifted into high gear after Superbrains et al. showed up. Apparently, there was a double banning today. One person (whom I know) doesn't even participate in the ID debates. The other was there for less than a month! Methinks this was all done to set an example, getting rid of the less relevant people as it were. My guess is that charlie d is next. Then Beast. Then JP. Andm after that, who's left in the critics' camp?

[ November 15, 2002: Message edited by: Principia ]</p>

Principia

Just so that I am not focusing too much on my old romping grounds, here's a similar style of moderation going at ISCID:
<a href="http://www.iscid.org/ubb/ultimatebb.php?ubb=get_topic;f=6;t=000216" target="_blank">http://www.iscid.org/ubb/ultimatebb.php?ubb=get_topic;f=6;t=000216</a>

Honestly, people, I don't see any effort spent at these forums as being productive at all. You either run up against a brick wall when talking to an IDiot, or you run up against a brick wall when it comes to the moderation. Hell, yersinia might as well have posted his critique here or at talk.origins, and would have received wider readership without the point being obscured by some Moderator's petty lessons on netiquette.

[ November 15, 2002: Message edited by: Principia ]</p>

Xeluan

I saw that. Interesting.

Then I've just gone and criticized Superbrains myself. I really think he should think more about trying to write clearly than assume that pseudo-philosophical obsufucation means you are intelligent.

Xeluan

-RRH-

The difference is that here, the minority is to blame, and there, the establishment is at fault.


That said, I think it would be fairer to say that the ID-critics who go to ARN and ISCID and many of the theists who come here are cut from much the same cloth.