Re: [asa] Meyer Defends Collins

Jerry Coyne has responded to Meyer and accuses him of "lying."

http://whyevolutionistrue.wordpress.com/2009/07/22/stephen-meyer-lies-again/

Coyne provides no evidence to support his ad hominem attack. Meyer noted, ""Jerry Coyne from the University of Chicago [is an] evolutionary biologist and thinks it's inappropriate for someone who believes in God and who further believes that science and God are compatible to be the head of a scientific organization." For this statement to be a lie, two things would need to be true:

1. Coyne does not think it is inappropriate for Collins to be head of the NIH and;

2. Meyer would have to know this (a lie occurs only when someone claims X is true when they know it is not true; if they don't know it is not true, then the claim would only be a mistake or misinterpretation).

I would thus note that Coyne makes no effort to show that Meyer knew his interpretation was wrong and, more importantly, Meyer's interpretation was quite reasonable. For example, I myself reached the same interpretation independent of Meyer.

Consider that Coyne does indeed believe it was a "mistake" to appoint Collins head of the NIH. Now, if it is a mistake to appoint Collins head of the NIH, another way of saying this is that Collins should not have been appointed to head the NIH.

At this point, we only need ask Coyne one simple question - WHY is it a mistake to appoint Collins?

Coyne offered only one reason:

"I won't grouse too much about this, but do want to emphasize again that the guy is deeply, deeply superstitious, to the point where, on his website BioLogos and his book The Language of God, he lets his faith contaminate his scientific views. So I can't help but be a bit worried."

and

"And a Scientologist who publicly espoused his belief in Xenu and thetans would be considered too much of a lunatic to have responsibility for the NIH. But of course Christianity is a publicly acceptable form of superstition, and Scientology is not.

I had hoped that Obama might end governmental coddling of faith, but it doesn't look like a lot has changed."

http://whyevolutionistrue.wordpress.com/2009/07/10/francis-collins-as-nih-director/

Apart from publicly complaining about Collins' "superstition," and accusing President Obama of "coddling" faith, Coyne provides no other reason for thinking this appointment was a mistake. Reason thus dictates that Coyne opposed the appointment simply because Collins openly expresses his religious views.

-Mike

  ----- Original Message -----
  From: Nucacids
  To: asa@calvin.edu
  Sent: Thursday, July 23, 2009 11:57 PM
  Subject: [asa] Meyer Defends Collins

  http://www.onenewsnow.com/Culture/Default.aspx?id=612554

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Received on Fri Jul 24 22:19:27 2009