PZ Myers v. G. Simmons
In general, debating antievolutionists is pretty pointless. But PZ Myers (blogger at Pharyngula) took on Geoffrey Simmons from the Discovery Institute, and even the die-hard sycophants at Bill Dembski’s blog had to admit the IDC guy took a whalloping. You can get the MP3 of the event now. You cannot get the comments at UD recognizing that Myers out-argued Simmons; somebody with moderator authority there decided to unpublish or delete the whole thread. That whole ostrich-head-in-sand-thing… does that actually work?
Yes it does Wes. Exhibit ‘A’, the continued survival of UD.
The “debate” was quite painful to listen to. I doubt anyone at UD will draw any attention to the debate. Yet, they did actually post a link to the mp3 file of the debate (http://www.uncommondescent.com/intelligent-design/dr-geoff-simmons-vs-pz-myers-debate/-) anyone who knows anything will recognize it was pure demolition. I felt quite embarrassed for Simmons throughout the whole thing but especially when he brought the whole issues of the lack or absence of transitional forms between deer-like land animals and modern whales and the tiring “fact vs. theory” issue up. He just came off as incredibly uninformed. Didn’t Gould publish a paper a long time ago discussing Evolution as Fact and as Theory? The problem is I’ve noticed Physicians completely have a different outlook on the meaning of “Theory” than do scientists. I have had discussions about this issue with my father and his teacher who are both Neurosurgeons. I’d be curious what my father would say about what Simmons and Myers say about the composition of the brain.
I agree with the points Myers made in the debate but I’ll say one thing, he comes off as rather classless with his comments about Simmons’ supposed ignorance of sex and the location of the clitoris. This is a man who is in his 50’s? He sounds like someone in their early 20’s. It might be humorous to some but it just comes off as tasteless. Btw, Dr. Elsberry do you have a copy of any debates between yourself and Dembski? I saw a snip bit a few years ago – was curious to hear more. I’m going to read your article in a book a just bought “Scientists Confront Creationism”.
PZ is direct… it’s not the style I use myself, but I think that there was substantial provocation.
There’s video online of an encounter between Dembski and I in 2001. The links are in this PT article.
Simmons was ignorant about sex, and about everything else, and this is all stuff he supposedly studied enough to write books about. So PZ is calling someone ignorant who is ignorant about something they’ve written books about in and in which that person takes scientists to task for not accepting his ignorant views… I think under those circumstances PZ was exceedingly restrained.