Banality of ID "thought" horrifyingly revealed on Dilbert blog

Scott Adams, creator of Dilbert, has taken it upon himself to blandly weigh in on the ID/Evolution debate on his blog and in the process, he's managed to draw fire from one of the sharpest critics of ID (in mind and tongue), PZ Myers of pharyngula.org. Myers is an associate professor of biology at the University of Minnesota in Morris whose specialty is evolutionary development as reflected in the embryos of zebra fish. Sounds dull, maybe, but his specialty, nicknamed evo-devo, is one of the most on fire in all of the sciences right now. It looks at how DNA actually puts animals (and other life forms) together, revealing deep conservation of naturally selected "design" forms, and in turn, accumulating more evidence of the ultimate correctness of Darwin's insight into how species originate and differentiate from each other.

Adams and Myers's back and forth is interesting in and of itself. Adams begins by claiming to criticize both sides in the debate for failing to understand where the other is coming from, then citing several ID talking points showing why he thinks this is true in particular of the "Darwinist side." His first post is here. When Myers counterattacked, charging that Adams was viewing scientists through the distorted lens of ID propaganda, Adams retorted that Myers had unwittingly fallen into the trap of a satirist poking fun at self-important "experts." Myers could only roll his eyes in return.

If Adams's big problem really is with experts, this seems like an inherently weak position to argue from: Ruling out the idea of expertness per se would seem to rule out one's own authority even as a critic of expertise in general. And it certainly isn't this notion that is driving the all-out blog war Adams's original post has unleashed between readers of his and Myers' blogs.

If you wonder why anti-evolutionism is so prevalent in America, you might find some clues reading through the comments in Adams's blog. There you will find the occasional out-and-out young-earth creationist stating such question-begging idiocies as, (I slightly paraphrase), "If God says He created the world in six days, His Word is good enough for me." You can only laugh at that kind of circular illogic. Much more disturbing--and more common, on the blog certainly, but also in the US at large?--is the middle-brow anti-intellectualism driving most of the "anti-Darwinist" sentiment among Adams's readers. Here's a small sampling:

The funny part of "evolutionary thinking" is the big bang theory. If i told you a library exploded millions of years ago and bits and pieces of words floated around for eons . then pure luck brought some of the pieces all together to form the first known dictionary, you'd think i was nuts.

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ToddCommish set it well. They don't get the joke because they are the joke. It's like a kid with a kick me sign on his back. Everyone looks at him funny, no one says a thing. Only thing is were kicking Mrs. Phish and company, and saying "here's your sign", but they just... arent... getting it...

sunuva... more people too smart for their own good. They talk about their logic and how the emotional hogwash associated with ID is wrong, but they can't put their own passion for evolution aside to see a humorist at work. Overweight people don't laugh at fat jokes, evolutionists don't laugh at this.
Too bad they're missing out.

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Maybe the reason PZ is so hostile is that he's suffering from extream sexual exhausion? Althougth he could just use his other hand to type his blogs. Or maybe PZ is a girl and it's just PMS? That could also create this kind of malicious contempt.

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Todays "scientists" are yesterdays nerds and geeks that could never get a date and are super PO'd about it. That's why there's so much hostility shrouding this debate.
Can we please move on to another topic?

ps. great strip today Scott. i never knew what eyebrows were for until now.

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It's like this: evolution focuses on "how." I.D. focuses on "why". Do they conflict? Well, maybe, but you have to *make* them conflict. Evolutionists will happily tell you man evolved from apes which evolved from rodents which evolved from bacteria which evolved from Howard Dean, or something like that. And I.D. says, "bacteria was such an improvement over Howard Dean, but I think we can do even better."

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There is no point in arguing with an idiot. First he is going to drag you down to his level and then he will beat you with experience.

And I don't personally care wether the idiot is an ID idiot or an darwinist idiot.

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Have you ever noticed that thereare far too many stupid people about? that PZ bloke sounds like a great example.

Anyway loving the blog and the cartoon still so keep it up!

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I would very much like to know why no one (I'll admitt that I did not read the last half of responses to this post) has even brought up the scientific evidence that makes the theory of evolution no less than questionable. I.e. the fact that octupus eyes are more similar to human eyes than any other animal's or the fact that no scientist that I know of has ever made a one-celled organism into a two or more celled organism. www.icr.org has more information like this.

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And so on ad nauseam.

So why is there such resistance in the US to accepting the overwhelming evidence of evolution by natural selection as an explanation for the origin of species? Why the insistence that ID is a theory of equal substance to evolution by natural selection when it is in fact a non sequitur? Is it because so many Americans really believe in the literal truth of the Bible and are on the same page as the Thomas More Foundation lawyers who know ID is creationism in disguise? Or is it just because so many Americans have never gotten into the habit of actually thinking?

The evidence for the latter is compelling.

... the one who does his miracles in the dark, and scurries away when you turn on the lights.

Such a god is a myth of course, but he comes in handy for explaining anything in nature you don't want to think about.

EVERYBODY knows the Flying Spaghetti Monster is the only true God!

We, as citizens of the United States of America, are the most ignorant and poorly educated members of the developed world. Not only are we ignorant, but have put education so low in our list of priorities that creationists have managed to not only convince a significant percentage of our population that religion is somehow science, but that science is wrong. In another 50 years, we'll be burning witches again.