Guide to Dealing with Intelligent Design Bullshit

So, I recently got sucked into debating evolution with a friend's dad who was not a big fan to say the least. I should have known better. I try to stay away from certain disappointment, but I can't help but defend the lovely theory that has done so much for progressing our understanding of the universe and our place in it. Every time I feel myself being sucked into one of these arguments with someone so set in their ways, my first thought is to keep my mouth shut, but then I ask myself, as I often do in times of uncertainty, what would Dawkins do? I think we all know that dapper British mother fucker wouldn't back down from a good challenge. Needless to say, the argument went on for several hours and absolutely nothing was accomplished. At the root of this debate were many of the same ridiculous misconceptions that so many intelligent design proponents spew like broken records. As the title may suggest, I've decided to throw together a short guide to help deal with those predictable and weak arguments that we will all sadly encounter at some point.

1. The "It's Just a Theory" Argument
Yes, it's called the THEORY of evolution. There's also germ theory, the general and special theory of relativity, probability theory, the universal theory of gravity, cell theory, the wave theory of light, and countless more than I highly doubt any ID proponent has a problem with. I can halfway understand this objection because of the discrepancy between the colloquial usage and the scientific usage of the word, but this is a misconception that can be cleared up rather quickly.

theory (from merriam-webster online): 6 a: a hypothesis assumed for the sake of argument or investigation b: an unproved assumption.

theory (from Biology or any other science textbook): A widely accepted explanation supported by a large body of observations and experiments. A good theory relates facts that appear unrelated; it predicts new facts and suggests new relationships.

2. Where are the Transitional Species?
umm...here

Whale evolution is one of many lines that is particularly well understood.


3. Why isn't There a Perfect Fossil Record?
The conditions necessary to fossilize organic material are somewhat uncommon. The process requires the deceased or living animal to be quickly covered by sediment, tar, ice or other material that can slow or stop the decay process. Some environments are very inhospitable to the formation of fossils. Rainforests, for example, produce very few fossils because organic material rapidly decays on the forest floor. In short, fossilization requires a rare combination of the right place and the right time to occur.

4. Where's all them amoeber-cats at?
Sadly, this is actually an argument that my roommate heard from a kid in his biology class. The idea that there should be some sort of half-and-half mutant animal hybrid is beyond ignorant. I guess it would be pretty cool though.

Dance Monkey Dance!

Jean Cut Offs

So I was hanging out at the Barcade tonight and jean cut offs are sooo in.

The Power of Language

We are all well aware of the many advantages that language offers us as humans. Whether it's in Vonnegut's entertaining prose, Chomsky's informative lectures, or O'reilly's infuriating rants, language offers its patrons the unique ability to transform the thoughts of those around them with surgical precision. Not as well known, however, is the notion that language shapes cognition according to its own unique syntactic and semantic structure. Put more succinctly, different languages affect the way we think about the world differently. This seems somewhat intuitive but has only relatively recently been widely accepted by the linguistic community as an alternative to the Chomskyan theory of universal grammar. According to this theory, thought is shaped not by the subtleties of a specific language but by a universal set of principles that is common to all humans. This new idea, known as the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis, turns the Chomskyan era idea on its head, as recent experiments have shown that language affects the way we categorize the world, perceive color, and may even partially explain why Asians vastly out perform Americans in math every year.

In Malcolm Gladwell's new book Outliers, he attempts to debunk the American rags to riches story by emphasizing the context surrounding the seemingly unlikely success of outliers like Bill Gates, Bill Joy, and the Beatles (a bootstrapping conservative's worst nightmare). In explaining why Asians dominate western countries in math abilities, he argues that it's largely a product of the culture of discipline and hard work that thousands of years of rice farming has built into the people of the region. Instead of settling with the notion that Asians are just inherently smarter then the rest of the world, Gladwell tries to make sense of this phenomenon with not only an understanding of history and culture but also of language. Inherent in languages like Chinese are distinct advantages when it comes to understanding and manipulating numbers. Unlike English, which has an irregular number system (ex. 16=sixteen but 11= eleven not oneteen), Chinese utilizes a logical number system in which eleven is ten-one, twelve is ten-two, and so on. Also, Chinese number words are relatively brief compared to English number words. This allows Chinese speakers to memorize and manipulate longer strings of numbers than most other cultures. These two simple linguistic differences allow Chinese speakers to have a better conceptual understanding of mathematics and consequently allows them to perform simple calculations with more ease. Having this slight advantage as a child, when we all struggle to make sense of numbers, could mean the difference between a very discouraged math student and a budding young mathlete.

New Obsession

Although my current job is incredibly shitty for several different reasons, it does allow me the opportunity to get lost in quality NPR programming for several hours a day. While my body is recruited to perform an endless list of robotic, mindless tasks, my mind escapes away to a world filled with stimulating, emotional, and thought provoking stories masterfully crafted by Ira Glass, (This American Life) Jad Abumrad, (Radiolab) and other exceptional radio personalities. Thanks NPR...I really do need to donate.

I'll Start Here

Whether it’s the incessant blinking coming from my hibernating laptop or the distracting notion that my sleeping kitty may have hundreds of shitty little flees gathering reinforcements to attack my bed and man body that is keeping me awake I know not, but its 2:30 in the morning and I’m awake and have decided to do something I’ve wanted to do for some time…start a blog. I figure it’s probably one of the most progressive/constructive things I can do with my so far incredibly mundane, work driven summer. Although some of my friends, you know who you are, are skeptical of blogging and all blog related media, I think the platform offers a unique stream of consciousness like ability to ramble about whatever I deem worthy…which is fucking sweet. Needless to say, this blog will cover all things schum-approved whether it’s music, books, SCIENCE, or just random musings about this unique space and time that we collectively occupy as humans.