Re: Phil Johnson's Approach -- AIDS

Peter Vibert (pvibert@i-2000.com)
Mon, 24 Feb 1997 20:15:42 -0500

Terry Gray wrote:
>As I understand Phil's position on the HIV / AIDS connection, he believes
>that, as with neo-Darwinism, the scientific establishment settled too soon
>on a hypothesis and squashed dissenting opinion using all means
>available--education, funding, etc. He relies on Duesberg and Duesberg
>supporter, Nobel prize winning molecular biologist, Kerry Mullis, in the
>same way that he relies on Mike Behe, Paul Nelson, Michael Denton, et al.
>in the evolution argument. So the two agendas actually have a lot in
>common.
>

I agree Phil's positions on AIDS and evolution have had much in common -
not only in his reliance on dubious sources, his tendency to smell
conspiracy, and his denigration of the motives of others, but also in his
inability to deal with uncertainty.

With Duesberg, he thought HIV infection couldn't be the cause of AIDS
because so many questions were (then) unanswered - eg. why were virus
titers so low - but most of these have now been satisfactorily dealt with.
HIV infection has proved to be a remarkably complex phenomenon...

Peter Vibert