Some particularly percipient commentary from Bill Dembski

I don't agree with atheists being called "brights", but I wonder who does more head nodding. The "creationist mega conferance" or a series of scientific journals all subject to peer-review?

Dembski is slowly losing it. When insult and ridicule are considered blog-worthy (and newsworthy by his hangers-on)... his scientific pursuits are not exactly going swimmingly.

And if you do not understand why Project Steve is ideal satire... I am not sure I can help you.

If you cannot understand why Project Steve is hopelessly lame and feeds into the stereotype of the socially-inept, pocket protector equipped scientist-nerd...I am not sure I can help you.

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Perhaps you could elaborate, or do you not wish to lower your self to that level?

Brennin said:

If you cannot understand why Project Steve is hopelessly lame and feeds into the stereotype of the socially-inept, pocket protector equipped scientist-nerd...I am not sure I can help you.

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I think you got some issues Stan.
How on earth does Project Steve proliferate a stereotype? Are all these Dr Steve's bespectacled nerds? Is every Steve a nerd?

I wouldn't even call Project Steve satire. It's a bit of fun with a very serious point. Creationists are forever brining up how 'more and more scientists are turning from evolution' but then failing to back it up. Project Steve is a light hearted way of showing this just isn't the true.

A bit like this list.

http://chem.tufts.edu/AnswersInScience//demise.html

Ryal Kane said:

http://chem.tufts.edu/AnswersInScience//demise.html

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"In the next five years, molecular Darwinism -- the idea that Darwinian processes can produce complex molecular structures at the subcellular level -- will be dead...” William Dembski...(2004)

Is Dembski some type of soothsayer? Where does he obtain the knowledge to make this prediction? (I thought Miss Cleo had closed up shop.) He’s got four years to go, and I’m certain when 2009 rolls around, we will not see a retraction by Mr. Dembski.

Brennin said:

You must be thinking of PT.

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Panda's Thumb is hardly a single individual's self-serving polemic-fest. Even you can find real science on there.

If you cannot understand why Project Steve is hopelessly lame and feeds into the stereotype of the socially-inept, pocket protector equipped scientist-nerd...I am not sure I can help you.

PS You know about as much concerning genuine humor as you do Bayesian reasoning (which is to say, not at all).

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No matter. I now have your lame mini-rants to entertain me.

Thou sayest.

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So thats a "No" then?

Don't you want to justify your statements?

questions-

In project steve why did they choose steve?

Didn't Dembski say critics are fighting ID because it threatens their masculinity?

Brennin said:

(Reposted from here)

On his blog, Bill Dembski wrote:

What we see here is a case of mass delusion in which a dysfunctional community of smug, cossetted intellectuals tell themselves exactly what they want to hear and then commend each other on their brilliance. Dawkins and Dennett made this self-congratulation explicit a few years back when they proposed referring to atheists as “brights.”

Amen to that. Although, at least the "Flying Spaghetti Monster" has a pretense of humor (and a cool pic) unlike the profoundly insipid "Project Steve" and its derivatives.

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This is the type of **** quacks always say. They're always picked on by bad guy scientists who just can't see the light of their brilliance.

Hint: ID = quackery. It's devoid of meaningful scientific content and is just another arm in creationism's octopus monster of irrationality.

P.S. How are you going to pick on Project Steve given its aim of pointing out the obvious fact that DI's "list of scientistis doubtful of darwinism" is utter garbage?

Brennin said:

Bill was referring to those who think that the FSM is a legitimate counter to ID as well as self-congratulatory "brights" and those (like Weinberg) who equate belief in God with belief in fairies.

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To be completely honest, that comparison isn't totally out there for those of us evil god doubters. A better comparison would probably be some other deity worshipped at some other point in time within a particular society. Zeus, Krsna, Marduk, whatever.

Behe's "biological ID" appears to be "devoid of meaningful scientific content," but I would not say the same about "cosmological ID."

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Well, I'm a bio geek, so I can't speak too strongly on cosmological issues. But I haven't seen anything particularly new or innovative on that end. Just some screwy "fine tuning" arguments that, imho, seem wanting.

Because it is "devoid of meaningful [humorous] content." Also, to quote Eugenie Scott, "Science is not a plebiscite."

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Everyone I know who's seen or read about project Steve has laughed, myself included. It's obviously not intended to be serious, but to demonstrate a point.

That point being that generating a list like the DI did isn't very difficult, and though 400 people sounds like a lot to a layperson, it's relatively meaningless in terms of the scientific community at large.

It was so not difficult that they were easily able to get more signatures just from people named Steve (or some variation thereof). In a way, that is very telling, and illustrates the point they intend to convey quite nicely.

I'm puzzled about your comments about Project Steve, Brennin, and I have as of yet not seen you explain them.

The statement by project Steve is a lot stricter than the DI-statement. There are also more restrictions on the people who can sign it. Yet, they had no trouble at all in getting enough Steve's on the list.

The point of this is easy. It shows very clearly that the DI-list of 'discenters from Darwin' is a vacuous argument. It isn't the kind of satire to have you laughing on the floor, not being able to eat for a week afterwards because you still have a stomach ache because you laughed so hard, but it's good enough for a smile. So what's wrong with it exactly?

I'm new to Project Steve and just enjoyed the description provided at the Talk Origins site (still to new to post links...bleh).

So I'm throwing my hat into the "those who had a good chuckle over it" arena.

It's point is painfully clear which is why I can see how offensive it would be were I sitting on the other side of the fence.

I love "Project Steve" but hate "brights."

Project Steve is a brilliant satire on the supposed lists of Creationist scientists. Even broadening the scope to Estefans, Estabans* and Stephanies, they still limited it to to point where the evolution vs. Creationist list is rediculous. Brights is pretentious and annoying even to an atheist who has been discussing religion for many years. Oh, and this is from someone who has met and fell in love with Dawkins (at least regarding his views on evolution).

I have attended all 3 James Randi Eductional Foundation Amaz!ing Meetings, and the speakers for the 4th included Jamie and Adam from Mythbusters, but since the concentration of the conference seems to be religion bashing, I've decided not to attend.

* For those of you familiar with the skeptic life after death issue might get a kick out of my alt-ID I was going to use "Esteban Black."

USincognito said:

I love "Project Steve" but hate "brights."

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Ditto that.