How to respond to requests to debate creationists

A professor at the University of Vermont, Nicholas Gotelli, got an invitation to debate one of the clowns at the Discovery Institute. Here’s what they wrote.

Dear Professor Gotelli,

I saw your op-ed in the Burlington Free Press and appreciated your support
of free speech at UVM. In light of that, I wonder if you would be open to
finding a way to provide a campus forum for a debate about evolutionary
science and intelligent design. The Discovery Institute, where I
work, has a
local sponsor in Burlington who is enthusiastic to find a way to make this
happen. But we need a partner on campus. If not the biology
department, then
perhaps you can suggest an alternative.

Ben Stein may not be the best person to single-handedly represent the ID
side. As you’re aware, he’s known mainly as an entertainer. A more
appropriate alternative or addition might be our senior fellows David
Berlinski or Stephen Meyer, respectively a mathematician and a philosopher
of science. I’ll copy links to their bios below. Wherever one comes down in
the Darwin debate, I think we can all agree that it is healthy for students
to be exposed to different views–in precisely the spirit of inviting
controversial speakers to campus, as you write in your op-ed.

I’m hoping that you would be willing to give a critique of ID at such an
event, and participate in the debate in whatever role you feel comfortable
with.

A good scientific backdrop to the discussion might be Dr. Meyer’s book that
comes out in June from HarperCollins, “Signature in the Cell: DNA and the
Evidence for Intelligent Design.”

On the other hand, Dr. Belinski may be a good choice since he is a
critic of
both ID and Darwinian theory.

Would it be possible for us to talk more about this by phone sometime soon?

With best wishes,
David Klinghoffer
Discovery Institute

You’ll enjoy Dr Gotelli’s response.

[Read more…]

An account of the transmission of a nasty infection across the Atlantic

The Guardian has a well-done article on British creationism, which looks from here like a low-rent, twee version of the rampant excesses of our American idiocy (We’re #1!). It also looks very familiar, with the same dead arguments and the same old delusions.

We also get new twists on old tropes. Remember the horrible New Scientist cover that we knew was going to be abused by the creationists? It is.

“I am guided ultimately by the parameters that the Bible lays down,” admits John Peet, travelling secretary of the Biblical Creation Society. He estimates that 90% of the congregation at the Chertsey Street baptist church in Guildford, where he worships and where I hear him address the “creation club”, are young earthers. The theme of pastor John Benton’s sermon in the evening is “Genesis and Evolution: Do They Fit Together?” He holds up a recent New Scientist cover, headlined “Darwin was wrong,” as evidence that the scientific base for evolution is crumbling, that the Darwinian tree of life can be uprooted.

I’ve got my copy of that issue, and you dedicated warriors against creationism might want to pick one up soon. One simple strategy to counter that nonsense is to ask if they read anything more than the title, so that you can open it up and show that they are lying about the science.

That cover was a mistake, and it is one more headache for us to deal with it…but as we all know, creationists will misuse anything to suit their agenda. They (and also, unfortunately, many defenders of evolution) like to blame atheism for creationism, too.

Mackay, too, is clutching a copy of that issue of New Scientist when I meet him. This is manna from heaven – the science establishment offering up gifts to the creationists. They also claim that the aggression of the new atheists is helping them. They paint Dawkins as a “recruiting sergeant” for creationism because he links evolutionary thinking with atheism. “He has been a real help to the ministry, ” says Randall Hardy.

Creationists argue that the new atheists are fuelling the dogmatism; Richard Harries, the former Bishop of Oxford and a theistic evolutionary, last week threw that accusation back at them. “Creationists totally misunderstand the Bible,” he said. “Genesis is in the business of story, myth, poetry, metaphor. They [creationists and atheists] feed off one another. The debate has an unreality about it. Those of us who are not fundamentalists can’t find a place.”

Atheism and evolution are linked because science provides an evidence-based, rational account of origins that makes the myths of faith superfluous. If the fact that many scientists have abandoned the crutch of religion makes you flee from reason to embrace the absurdities of the creationists, you weren’t a friend of science in the first place. These are people who claim the existence of a cure makes them love their disease all the more.

As for Mr Harries, I can understand how he can’t find a place — he’s got nothing but vapor wafted about by furiously waving hands to stand upon. Of course the book of Genesis is a pile of metaphor and myth — so is the whole freaking Bible. But a metaphor for what? It’s all very nice to stagger away from the literalist interpretation of the bible — I sympathize, it’s what we atheists have all done — but then we’re left with this curious pile of pages that is a collection of very badly done history, bizarre behavioral proscriptions, uneven poetry, unbelievable fairy tales, and utterly insane politics and prophecy, which people believe fervently and which, even among those apologists who excuse it as mere “metaphor”, is endorsed as a guide to moral behavior and eternal life.

If he finds the debate unreal, think how we people free of the god delusion see it: a minority of lunatics espousing the kinds of silliness described in the Guardian article, which is hard enough for us to believe, with a majority of gawping fish on the sidelines trying desperately to avoid any association with the creationist kooks while averting their eyes from the rational people fighting their battles for them because they know, deep down, that their feeble apologetics for a “metaphor” they believe in makes the bewildered middle-of-the-roaders just as ridiculous as the creationists.

What did I talk about in St. Paul this weekend?

This was kind of a lost weekend for me — Darwin Day on Thursday, Columbus on Saturday, St. Paul on Sunday, with all the flitting about through the air and on freeways in between, so I’m a bit swamped now on Monday morning, struggling to catch up with all the real important stuff that I get paid for in my job, and that I usually get done on the weekend. So no, Greg, I don’t have much to say about our panel discussion on evolution/creation education on Sunday — you’ll have to do it for me!

It was a good discussion, though, with a whole gang of UM educators up front talking about our diverse strategies for dealing with creationism in the classroom. The one thing I think we missed, and that Greg brought up several times, is more input from high school teachers. What we can do in a university and what others can do in a public school are very different, and I actually think the high school experience is more formative and more important.

Convergence, schmonvergence

I swore off reading Simon Conway Morris long ago, after reading his awful, incoherent book, Life’s Solution, which I peevishly reviewed. He’s the go-to guy for Cambrian paleontology, and he’s definitely qualified and smart, but he’s got two strikes against him: he’s a terrible writer, making most of his output well-nigh unreadable, and he’s one of those scientists with a serious god infection, which means much of what he writes collapses into babbling theology at some point.

He’s done it again. Simon Conway Morris has an opinion piece in the Guardian, and it’s his usual tirade: atheists are nasty people who don’t think about the meaning of evolution, which is that god created us. As Jerry Coyne points out, this makes him indistinguishable from your garden variety creationist.

I have tried to follow the logic of Conway Morris. I can’t. Here is the bulk of his article, with my futile attempts to dissect the chain of reasoning in his central premise. This won’t be an easy exercise.

Isn’t it curious how evolution is regarded by some as a total, universe-embracing explanation, although those who treat it as a religion might protest and sometimes not gently. Don’t worry, the science of evolution is certainly incomplete. In fact, understanding a process, in this case natural selection and adaptation, doesn’t automatically mean that you also possess predictive powers as to what might (or even must) evolve. Nor is it logical to assume that simply because we are a product of evolution, as patently we are, that explains our capacity to understand the world. Rather the reverse.

Let’s agree with much of this. Our understanding of evolution is far from complete, of course. No one with any sense argues that the outcomes of the evolutionary process are at all predictable — there are just too many possibilities, chance and history play too great a role, and results are always dependent on local conditions, which change. This paragraph induces great confusion in me, though, because when you read the rest of the article, and when you’ve read his excruciating book, you realize that Conway Morris actually claims the exact opposite: that he can predict the general outcomes of evolution, that human-like beings are an inevitable outcome, and that in fact, the whole panoply of life on earth follows predictable paths to a small suite of convergent solutions.

But wait a moment; everybody knows that evolution isn’t predictable. Yes, a rich and vibrant biosphere to admire, but no end-product any more likely (or unlikely) than any other. Received wisdom pours out the usual litany: random mutations, catastrophic mass extinctions and other mega-disasters, super-virulent microbes all ensure that the drunkard’s walk is a linear process in comparison to the ceaseless lurching seen in the history of life. So not surprisingly nearly all neo-Darwinians insist that the outcomes – and that includes you – are complete flukes of circumstance. So to find flying organisms on some remote planet might not be a big surprise, but certainly no birds. Perhaps all life employs cells, but would anybody dare to predict a mushroom? In fact the evidence points in diametrically the opposite direction. Birds evolved at least twice, maybe four times. So too with the mushrooms. Both are among the less familiar examples of evolutionary convergence.

No, this is not at all correct, but Conway Morris does find another point of congruence with creationists. Most evolutionary biologists certainly do see chance and contingency as very important contributors to diversity…but no one concludes that species are “complete flukes of circumstance”. I’m surprised that he didn’t follow through with the usual cliche about evolution being like a tornado assembling a 747 in a junkyard.

Then he leaps onto his favorite hobby horse, convergent evolution. Remember the first paragraph I quoted, where he denounces the idea that we might predict evolutionary outcomes? Here he goes again, telling us that he can — implying that we ought to expect birds and mushrooms on other planets. (By the way, I have absolutely no idea what he’s claiming when he says that birds have evolved on earth four times, independently. I’m actually a bit concerned that I don’t know what he means by “birds” — terms seem to have a certain fluidity in the oozing liquidity of his logic.) But yes, let’s hear more about convergence.

Convergence? Simply how from very different starting points organisms “navigate” to very much the same biological solution. A classic example are our camera eyes and those of the squid; astonishingly similar but they evolved independently. But let’s not just concentrate on the squid eye, from molecules to social systems convergence is ubiquitous. Forget also the idea that in biology nearly anything is possible, that by and large it is a massive set of less than satisfactory compromises. In fact, paradoxically the sheer prevalence of convergence strongly indicates that the choices are far more limited, but when they do emerge the product is superb. Did you know eyes can detect single photons and our noses single molecules? Evolution has reached the limits of what is possible on planet Earth. In particular our doors of perception can only be extended by scientific instrument, enabling a panorama from the big bang to DNA.

I cannot bear it any more. I have to make a secondary complaint about Conway Morris’s piece. He seems to regard the English language as an axe murderer would a corpse: as an awkward obect that must be hacked into fragments, and the ragged chunks tossed into a rusty oil drum he calls an article. Continuity and flow are something that can be added after the fact, by pouring in a bag of quicklime. Unfortunately, one difference between the two is that Conway Morris will subsequently proudly display his handiwork in a newspaper, while the axe murderer at least has the decency to cart the grisly carnage off to the local landfill for anonymous and clandestine disposal. One can only hope that someday the paleontologist will perfect his emulation and take his work to the same conclusion.

As for convergence, Conway Morris focuses on it because it fits his desired conclusion, that biology is fore-ordained by a creator, not because it fits the totality of the evidence. I argue against the significance (but definitely not the reality) of convergence on two grounds.

  • Common descent tangles the interpretation of convergence hopelessly. I recommend an article in this week’s Nature by Shubin, Tabin, and Carroll that argues for an important concept of deep homology. We do see similar structures, such as limbs in insects and invertebrates, that are not at all homologous on a morphological level, but when we examine their molecular genetics, we find similar substrates for both. This is the central idea of deep homology, that we have shared primitives, a set of regulatory networks, that see reuse over and over again in evolution. So while limbs arose independently in insects and vertebrates, when we look more deeply, we find that both use the distal-less developmental pathway. We see convergence because there are common functional demands that channel the solutions of selection, but there are also shared molecular constraints that limit the range of likely solutions.

  • Conway Morris dwells far too much on the patterns that fit his model, and ignores the importance of divergence. For instance, one can focus on the way vertebrates have repeatedly evolved fusiform shapes for aquatic life: fish, ichthyosaurs, cetaceans. There certainly seems to be one likely answer that re-evolves over and over again. But these are all vertebrates, and that seems to be a pattern that is also a consequence of fundamentals of our body plan. But our seas are full of a very different solution: squid. Sure, they configure themselves into a streamlined teardrop shape for rapid locomotion, but they began with a very different body plan, and their solution is radically different, with long arms and jet propulsion. But then, perhaps, Conway Morris’s definition of “fish” is sufficiently fluid to include squid, ignoring the differences.

Convergence is interesting, and it does happen, but as a universal explanation for evolution, it is seriously lacking.

Yet how the former led to the latter, how it was that complexity emerged and is sustained even in that near-miracle of a chemical factory we call the cell is still largely enigmatic. Self-organisation is certainly involved, but one of the puzzles of evolution is the sheer versatility of many molecules, being employed in a myriad of different capacities. Indeed it is now legitimate to talk of a logic to biology, not a term you will hear on the lips of many neo-Darwinians. Nevertheless, evolution is evidently following more fundamental rules. Scientific certainly, but ones that transcend Darwinism. What! Darwinism not a total explanation? Why should it be? It is after all only a mechanism, but if evolution is predictive, indeed possesses a logic, then evidently it is being governed by deeper principles. Come to think about it so are all sciences; why should Darwinism be any exception?

Once again, in the welter of sentence fragments, we again see an example of convergence…between Conway Morris and creationists. There is the word “Darwinism” used as a pejorative; how often do we see that particular trope? Cells are really, really complex on the inside, full of “factories”, and he has a hard time imagining how they could have evolved without a designer — that’s straight from the Intelligent Design playbook. There too is the surprisingly ignorant accusation, in this case that neo-Darwinians are reluctant to use the word “logic”. If you’ve read Carroll’s Endless Forms Most Beautiful, for example, you’ll find it uses the word frequently — there is regulatory logic (which he explains with liberal use of comparisons with computer science), developmental logic, evolutionary logic. We simply do not hesitate to point out a rational examination of the world of biology does reveal order and pattern! Science wouldn’t work if the universe were purely chaotic. Where we differ is that we see that logic as a product of the natural properties of our universe, not as the product of a deity, but that does not mean that we deny order.

But there is more. How to explain mind? Darwin fumbled it. Could he trust his thoughts any more than those of a dog? Or worse, perhaps here was one point (along, as it happens, with the origin of life) that his apparently all-embracing theory ran into the buffers? In some ways the former possibility, the woof-woof hypothesis, is the more entertaining. After all, being a product of evolution gives no warrant at all that what we perceive as rationality, and indeed one that science and mathematics employ with almost dizzying success, has as its basis anything more than sheer whimsy. If, however, the universe is actually the product of a rational Mind and evolution is simply the search engine that in leading to sentience and consciousness allows us to discover the fundamental architecture of the universe – a point many mathematicians intuitively sense when they speak of the unreasonable effectiveness of mathematics – then things not only start to make much better sense, but they are also much more interesting. Farewell bleak nihilism; the cold assurances that all is meaningless. Of course, Darwin told us how to get there and by what mechanism, but neither why it is in the first place, nor how on earth we actually understand it.

Now we get a shift in emphasis. Somehow, the evidence of convergent evolution is supposed to point to a godly plan for life, but also human consciousness, which he argues is unique, is also supposed to point to god. It really doesn’t matter what phenomenon Conway Morris discusses — common solutions or one-off oddities, they all seem to cry out “god!” to the god-soaked mind. He thinks this is interesting, but I’m afraid that I find postulating untestable, unevidenced phenomena like a supreme being to explain reality is a tedious cop-out.

Of course, the claim that atheism implies “bleak nihilism” is yet another common canard. I am an atheist, yet neither am I bleak nor a nihilist. I know very, very few people who could even be called nihilists, but Conway Morris must find it easier to invent a caricature to rail against than to actually consider that most atheists are reasonably positive and find rationality to be a solace and an advantage.

To reiterate: when physicists speak of not only a strange universe, but one even stranger than we can possibly imagine, they articulate a sense of unfinished business that most neo-Darwinians don’t even want to think about. Of course our brains are a product of evolution, but does anybody seriously believe consciousness itself is material? Well, yes, some argue just as much, but their explanations seem to have made no headway. We are indeed dealing with unfinished business. God’s funeral? I don’t think so. Please join me beside the coffin marked Atheism. I fear, however, there will be very few mourners.

Yes, I seriously believe that consciousness is a product of a natural process. I find that the neuroscientists, psychologists, and philosophers who proceed from that premise are the ones who are actually making useful contributions to our understanding of the mind. We have not found any property of the human mind that is not dependent on the physical substrate of the brain (which does not preclude the possibility that other factors could contribute, but no one, including Conway Morris, ever manages to stutter out a useful alternative in public. Does he want to postulate a soul? I’m sure he does. But he never quite manages the courage to state it outright.)

This is a strange funeral Conway Morris is attending. The corpse is awfully lively, dancing about the room, courting all the pretty young boys and girls, thumbing its nose at the stuffy preacher, and jeering at the morose and inarticulate creationist standing in the corner with his shiny, unused shovel. Need I mention that we’ve buried a succession of gods? Apollo is gone, Zeus is no more, Thor is neglected, Dionysius is scarcely remembered (although I’m sure his wake was to die for), and almost all the gods people have ever worshipped are extinct. I’m sure Jesus will follow sometime, and this next time, there will be no resurrection — he’ll be the archaic myth that people only recall in literary metaphor.

Atheism will only die with human reason. It could happen, and Conway Morris is right — there may be no mourners. But there should be.

Creation science fair report

I missed the science fair (I might get a shot at it later today), but a reader did send in a quick report on what you’ll find there.

I stopped by the Twin Cities Creation Science Fair Saturday night at the Har Mar mall. I am not a science educator so I may not be a fair judge and I don’t know how the various ages should relate to their various projects. I did not take a close look at all of them but there were some that seemed fairly decent, effects on plant growth, measuring impurities and contaminants in well vs tap water, air rifle velocity measurement, measuring wood hardness, color blindness in dogs. There seemed to be a number experiments on dogs. It seems house pets make convenient experimental animal subjects. There was also a simple spectrometer made from a music CD that I had seen of before.

One experiment looked at the affect of gum chewing on memory which I thought was questionable until I googled it. Apparently it has been studied and there is supposedly some beneficial effect.

However, there were a some displays that were not much of anything. One display essentially said nothing more than “we don’t fall of the Earth because of Earth’s gravity”. (I wonder what kind of force would otherwise make us fall off the Earth. Perhaps the idea of drifting off was intended.) Other displays were simplistic models of human digestive system, circulatory systems and such. Some of the writing on the display boards were rather poor as were some of the experimental procedures and controls. Displays also had their Bible quotes describing the connection to their science project.

There wasn’t much creation science in the fair this year. There seemed to be fewer creation/anti-evolution displays than past years. I spotted only one this time which might be considered an improvement. There was a display that made a very simplistic comparison of airplanes and helicopters with flying animals (bird, bat, dragonfly) and concluded that since the animals fly better than designed flying machines, they must also be designed. Irreducibility was also mentioned.

One experiment I thought was noteworthy looked at the time it takes for different brands of vitamin tablets to dissolve in water to counter the claim that some vitamin tablets are passed undissolved, even through sewer systems. (for more info, search: undigested vitamin.) I became familiar with this false claim when I did some research of my own after some people I know tried to sell me vitamins in gel form (agel.com). Supposedly they can be absorbed so much faster. (Why is it better for vitamins to be absorbed quickly anyway?) I did the same experiment myself with the vitamin brand I take. This experiment explicitly challenged a false claim for which I give the student credit.

Overall, the displays were not too different from what I have seen in previous years. Some are decent, but the rest can range from fairly mediocre to quit poor. But there are a few here and there that can stand out. One year a student did experiments on people on the unreliability of eye witness testimony which I thought was quite good, but a bit ironic coming from a Bible based science fair. I wish I could remember his Bible verse. Maybe if I had only been chewing gum at the time.

It sounds like a fairly typical science fair, made just a little sadder by the compulsion to insert biblical apologetics into everything.

Louisiana boycotts science; scientists boycott Louisiana

One of my favorite meetings is the annual Society for Integrative and Comparative Biology meetings. One of my favorite cities to visit is New Orleans, Louisiana. The two pleasures will not be coinciding at any time in the near future because of the ineptitude and inanity of Louisiana’s legislature and governor, Bobby Jindal. Here’s the press release from the LA Science Coalition:

National Scientific Society to Boycott Louisiana over LA Science Education Act

The first tangible results of the Louisiana legislature’s passage and Gov. Bobby Jindal’s signing of the 2008 Louisiana Science Education Act have materialized, and these results are negative both for the state’s economy and national reputation. The Society for Integrative and Comparative Biology, a national scientific society with more than 2300 members, has put Gov. Bobby Jindal on notice that the society will not hold its annual meetings in Louisiana as long as the LA Science Education Act is on the books. In a February 5, 2009,letter to the governor that is posted on the SICB website under the headline, “No Thanks, New Orleans,” SICB Executive Committee President Richard Satterlie tells Jindal that “The SICB executive committee voted to hold its 2011 meeting in Salt Lake City because of legislation SB 561, which you signed into law in June 2008. It is the firm opinion of SICB’s leadership that this law undermines the integrity of science and science education in Louisiana.” [NOTE: Although the legislation was introduced as SB 561, it was renumbered during the legislative process and passed as SB 733.]

Pointing out that SICB had joined with the American Institute of Biological Sciences (AIBS) in urging Jindal to veto the legislation last year, Satterlie goes on to say that “The SICB leadership could not support New Orleans as our meeting venue because of the official position of the state in weakening science education and specifically attacking evolution in science curricula.” Salt Lake City was chosen as the site of the 2011 meeting in light of the fact that “Utah, in contrast, passed a resolution that states that evolution is central to any science curriculum.”

Noting that SICB’s recent 2009 meeting in Boston attracted “over 1850 scientists and graduate students to the city for five days,” Satterlie pointedly tells Jindal that “As you might imagine, a professional meeting with nearly 2000 participants can contribute to the economic engine of any community.” The implication of SICB’s decision for both New Orleans, which is still recovering from Hurricane Katrina, and the entire state of Louisiana is clear. With Gov. Jindal threatening draconian budget cuts to the state’s universities, the loss of such a significant scientific convention will only add to the state’s deepening fiscal crisis.

Satterlie closes by telling Jindal that SICB will join with other groups “in suggesting [that] professional scientific societies reconsider any plans to host meetings in Louisiana.” However, SICB is not the first national scientific society to bring up the subject of boycotting Louisiana. Gregory Petsko, president of the American Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology (ASBMB), has already called for a boycott not only of Louisiana but of any state that passes such legislation: “As scientists, we need to join such protests with our feet and wallets. . . . I think we need to see to it that no future meeting of our society [after the ASBMB’s already contracted 2009 meeting in New Orleans] will take place in Louisiana as long as that law stands.” (See“It’s Alive,” ASBMB Today, August 2008.)

After the Louisiana legislature passed the LA Science Education Act, a total of nine national scientific societies publicly called on Jindal to veto it. He ignored them, as well as everyone else who contacted him requesting that he veto the bill, choosing instead to help execute the agenda of the Louisiana Family Forum (LFF), the Religious Right organization on whose behalf Louisiana Sen. Ben Nevers introduced the bill and on whose behalf Jindal signed it. Jindal is a staunch ally of the LFF. The citizens of Louisiana, whose educational well-being the governor claims to be so concerned about, are now paying the price–literally–for his loyalty to his conservative Christian base.

Sorry, Louisiana. You are a lovely state, but scientists won’t be supporting you as long as you’re going to be dedicated to anti-scientific foolishness.

Other states don’t have cause for complacency, though — creationism is not exclusively a Southern problem. If this keeps up, we may be having all of our scientific meetings in Canada.

Luskin flaunts his persecution complex, again

Shorter Casey Luskin: Waa, waa — they call me mean names!

Really, that’s the whole of his extended whine in US News & World Report, a long complaint that “darwinists” aren’t nice to him. It’s pathetic, but that’s what we’ve come to expect from Mr Squeaky. You really only need two pieces of information. 1) His opening paragraph:

Most Darwinists involved in the public debate today have one, and only one goal: To stifle free debate on this subject and thereby discourage you, the public, from scrutinizing the scientific evidence for yourself.

And 2) the knowledge that he wrote a 6800 word opinion piece that never once mentions any of that hypothetical scientific evidence for ID. Not one tiny scrap. You know, if I had 6800 words that I began with the assertion that I had scientific evidence for an idea that a shadowy cabal was keeping from the public, I think I’d take advantage of that opportunity to reveal the hidden wisdom that had been suppressed. Funny how they never manage to do that.

For some perspective: my Seed column is about 1500 words. A newspaper column might be 6 or 700 words. Luskin took the opportunity to run off his mouth at extravagant length, and said absolutely nothing.

Things that make creationists look stupid

Creationists do not like the idea of vestigial organs, no sir. That their divine creator might have slipped up and stuck in some tissue that is less than perfect is anathema to them, and so we often encounter bitter denunciations of the whole concept of vestigial organs — organs which have a modified or reduced function, and which are largely superfluous. The best example is the human appendix, which can be snipped out and thrown away with the patient no worse for the experience (other than, of course, the general consequences of surgery). You can find many examples of creationists insisting that the appendix really is a an important organ, but I was just pointed to a real doozy at Kent Hovind’s site. This one had me laughing out loud before the end.

Start with the title: it is one of a series called “Things that make evolutionists look stupid”. This particular article is about the appendix, and it starts out conventionally enough, for a creationist screed.

For years surgeons removed appendixes with the attitude that they had no function and were no serious loss. It is only fairly recently that it has been realized that the appendix has a number of functions, all of which are important. The appendix is an important part of our immune system. It is a germ free section of the dirtiest part of the body that helps the body produce antibodies and protects the intestinal tract from infection, It also is on the bottom of the only part of the intestinal tract where waste materials must move upward. The appendix performs an important role by creating fluids that force waste matter up this section of the intestines. Without an appendix we become more susceptible to a large number of diseases that are caused by bacteria and viruses, as well as to cancer.

Furthermore, as Ian Taylor has pointed out, many of our alleged ancestors, including monkeys and apes do not have appendixes, while rabbits, wombats and opossums do.

“Vestigial” does not mean “functionless”. It means that it has become superfluous or reduced. The appendix is loaded with lymphatic and immune system components, but this is unsurprising: such tissues are scattered throughout the digestive system. The question is, why is this patch of lymphatic tissue associated with a little protrusion of the gut? The author’s explanations don’t work. The idea that it’s producing fluids to push the gut contents upward is novel, but ridiculous — it’s tiny compared to the volume of the colon, and can’t produce that much fluid. If you’ve ever seen the small intestine, you’d also know that the ascending colon isn’t the only part of the tract where contents must flow upwards. It also isn’t “germ-free”, which is a silly assertion—your gut contains somewhere around 1014 bacteria. It’s a great sloshing tube of culture media for happy microorganisms.

As for the claim that it’s vital for health, I’ve seen a number of studies that look for statistical correlations between appendectomies and cancers, and even some experimental studies in animals where it was removed and outcomes measured against controls…and I’m sorry, I haven’t seen any suggestion that it had the effect described. The author would be better off moving to a more nebulous claim. I like the idea that it is the location of the soul, since I had mine removed when I was nine, and a few years later decided I was a godless atheist.

I don’t know who Ian Taylor is, but he seems willing to make up facts. Other primates do have an appendix; chimpanzees have even been known to develop acute appendicitis. The creationists just keep making stuff up! And need I add that up until now, he’s been arguing that the appendix is an essential organ, and now he is (falsely) claiming that other animals don’t need it?

But wait, this isn’t the funny part. That was the boring typical part. Here’s where I started laughing.

I would not offend the bought and sold fascists who regulate the health industry in America by offering medical advice,

Wait for it. You just know with a lead-up like that that what he is about to do is…offer medical advice.

but I will relate alternatives to appendectomies that have worked for others without actually advising anyone to follow these procedures. Richard Schulze, the successful naturopathic doctor so hated by the FDA and AMA for being successful, has outlined the way that he has dealt with appendicitis, which I will outline here. Appendix problems are caused by poor diet and severe constipation. The first thing that he recommends is to immediately stop eating and get an enema. A high enema, or high colonic, is very much preferable. A series of regular rectal enemas may have to suffice, if the proper equipment is not available. The enema will relieve the pressure that has built up inside of the appendix. It might even be a good idea to start with a rectal enema and work your way up to a high enema.

I’ve noticed that quacks are often obsessed with sticking things up people’s asses. I detect some sublimation going on here…

But wait, he’s not done.

Fasting is recommended to be done for a few days, during which time only juice or water should be drunk and some herbal laxatives. An appendix problem is much more serious if there has been a perforation. If there has been an infection caused by a perforated appendix, antibiotic-like herbs should be taken in very heavy doses. Purple coneflower (or echinacea, echinacea purpurea, pallida and angustifolia) and garlic (Allium sativum) are recommended. A light massage of the abdomen would help at this point, but it should only be done with great care, if there is inflammation.

This guy is actually prescribing enemas and herbs for a perforated appendix?

A final procedure is to apply castor oil packs 24 hours per day over the appendix. Only fresh caster oil should be used. Rancid castor oil can be more detrimental than beneficial.

OK, enough is enough. This is too silly, and going on much too long, especially for an article in which he says he isn’t going to give medical advice.

Oh, no. Here come the anecdotes.

Sandra Ellis describes treating her daughter for appendicitis in which the appendix actually did appear to have ruptured. She followed Jethro Kloss’s advice and used a lobelia poultice, which was supplemented by Christopher’s formula that added ginger, slippery elm and mullein. She also used comfrey tea and herbal enemas, olive oil and lobelia poultices, chamomile tea, catnip tea, alternating cold and heat packs, and reflexology. Her daughter recovered without an appendectomy, and without any infection. She provides the following formula for a poultice.

Shut up. That’s enough. I don’t need any recipes.

“Mix 1 tbs. of granulated or powdered lobelia with a large handful of granulated or crushed mullein leaves, and sprinkle with ginger. Add water to the herbs and mix into a paste, adding powdered slippery elm.”

Some doctors advise against using any type of laxative and suggest that this may cause a dangerous irritation of the appendix. This may be good advice, but these same doctors fail to suggest releasing pressure through the other end, which would precede the laxative and relieve most of the potential for a “dangerous” irritation.

The enemas…the creationists cannot resist them.

Once you get over an appendix problem, you must learn from the experience. Your eating habits should change and you should work to ensure that you remain regular. If you eat garbage that acts as intestinal glue, you get what you ask for. Most doctors have acquired the opinion that mutilation is the only option in the case of an appendicitis, and that without them death is inevitable. We can thank the stupidity of evolutionists for this harmful misconception.

See what I mean? This crank splutters out a bunch of nonsense about appendix function and phylogeny, then dedicates most of his article to tales of curing appendicitis with enemas and herbs, and then he closes by accusing evolutionists for promoting harmful misconceptions!

It’s good for a laugh, but there is one useful bit of information here. Never turn your back on a creationist.