Talk:Michael Behe/Archive 2

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Views contrary to Behe's come through loud and clear in every recent revision. Heavily biased wording ala Plumbago are clearly against the spirit of Wikipedia and should be relegated to the Talk section! (ChulaOne 10 July 2006)

Hi there. I'm reverting again because the edits you're restoring contain errors. Life categorically has not been "discovered to be far too complex"; it's not so much that Behe's views are contested in the scientific community as much as these views are unpublished in the community; also, it's not "some" of the community, it's almost all of it. Basically, the edits are misrepresenting the state of play. Weasel words have been inserted to soften the nearly universal rejection of Behe's ideas. Cheers, --Plumbago 15:34, 10 July 2006 (UTC)

Look, you clearly have an axe to grind here, and you do it quite well without the heavy-handedness of your reverts. Why not let readers reach their own conclusions? And to be fair, the full sentence does read " He is noted for advocating ..." Ann Coulter, by the way, has her own Wikipedia page if you care to weigh in on her, too. (ChulaOne 10 July 2006)

If I seem to have an axe to grind it's because I care about the representation (and misrepresentation) of science. I think it's important that pseudoscience is identified as such so that a non-technical audience is not misled. The edits you have been reverting (I know you didn't originate them) have specifically tried to mislead by obscuring the near-universal rejection of Behe's (unpublished) ideas by the scientific community. As these ideas are purportedly science, it's important that their treatment by scientists is recorded here. Other people are still perfectly entitled to make their own minds up, but it's crucial that the facts are presented as objectively as possible.

As for my "heavy-handed reverts", is there such a thing as a revert with a light touch? I am specifically trying to remove weasel words that aim to soften the scientific community's take on Behe's ideas. Reverts are pretty black and white.

Ann Coulter? Pardon? Where's that come from? I don't know why I'd want to edit the page of that poisonous demagogue. Cheers, --Plumbago 16:19, 10 July 2006 (UTC)

P.S. The lazy way to sign your posts is to use four tildas, ~~~~. The third button from the right at the top of the edit window should accomplish the same thing.

Plumbago is correct. Inclusion in the category pseudoscience is well supported by many notable cites at the ID article that ID is considered psuedoscience by the scientific community, making those who argue for ID promoters of pseudoscience. FeloniousMonk 16:45, 10 July 2006 (UTC)

Concur with FM; this is extremely well documented. KillerChihuahua^?!? 18:30, 10 July 2006 (UTC)

Plumbago is not correct. "the scientific community" you speak of are all educated in the same schools with the same presuppositions. "the scientific community" is the "evolutionist community". Getting enough people in the room to agree on something doesn't make it so. "the scietific community" at one time believed the world was flat. It also believed the sun revolved around the earth. Many theories have come and gone in our lifetime. The problem is holding on to something without alowing decenting voices. This is not science. In fact, those who will not listen to new evidence are practicing pseudoscience. <isuse33>Isuse33 04:11, 2 January 2007 (UTC)

The scientific communities that believed the Earth was flat and a geocentric universe are the same "scientific" communities that today support ID. Thanks for supporting the point, though I don't think it was the point you intended.Mzmadmike 17:29, 19 April 2007 (UTC)

Putting the anger aside, let's be reasonable here, please. Everyone has different opinions on something as unverifiable as Evolution. (Darwinism is used to refer to evolution, by the way; they aren't two different subjects or things) This article needs to be cleaned up to retain neutrality, period. It doesn't matter what school of thought (or brainwashing) you come from! So, there should logically be a section that clearly explains what his theory is, along with points from those who agree and those who don't (done with taste, in balence, and in neutrality). Then the article will be NEUTRAL (which is,by the way, the Wikipedia standards for every article). Shutting down a conversation, or silencing disent, or calling something a pseudoscience off hand (a very serious claim, by the way), is just not scholarly or polite. So let's please correct this so that this article can be at its finest. Also, Dr. Behes' theory IS Published, so how many times must a theory be published before it's a theory? This is getting rhetorical-- 209.77.231.239 (talk) 17:16, 16 November 2007 (UTC)Theodore from California

Hi Theodore from California. This particular discussion ended some time ago (April 2007). You might like to rephrase your point at the bottom of this page as a new comment. That way you're more likely to get feedback. Cheers, ---- Plumbago (talk) 17:27, 16 November 2007 (UTC)

No real point in reproducing it below -- the comment neither makes a case for any specific change to the article (other than the tired old whine that the scientific community is beating up on Behe's lazy and vacuous arse), nor are either its premises or its conclusions in any way valid. Hrafn^Talk_Stalk 17:37, 16 November 2007 (UTC)

Opening para

I have reworded the sentence about irreducible complexity, to better define the narrow range of his research. As I understand it, Behe is not opposed to evolution in a general sense (unlike some other ID proponents). Behe's claim is that natural selection alone cannot explain the existence of complex systems. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Aardvark92 (talk • contribs)

I reverted your addition, since the phrase "unguided natural selection" is an oxymoron. Guettarda 14:58, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

OK, how about just "natural selection"? Aardvark92 15:00, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

Not sure. If you (or he) says that a structure could not have originated through natural selection, does that mean that he allows that they could have evolved through other mechanisms? As I have read it intelligent design is a If not X then Y system, not an If not X then NOT X. If he accepted other evolutionary mechanisms, why would he need to come up with a non-evolutionary mechanism? Guettarda 15:06, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

As I understand it, Behe is not opposed to evolution per se. He acknowledges that evolution has occurred. His argument is that natural processes aren't sufficient to explain everything.[1] The wording of this sentence (before my edit) implied that Behe does not believe in evolution at all. I think that's misleading. Aardvark92 19:09, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

Even if it was misleading, this is also misleading, because it specifies natural selection. Do you have any reason to believe that Behe suggests that these structures/pathways could have originated through other evolutionary mechanisms, either known or unknown? Guettarda 20:06, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

I see your point. How about if I change "natural selection" to "evolutionary mechanisms"? Aardvark92 21:12, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

Mediation

A request for informal mediation has been made here: Wikipedia:Mediation Cabal/Cases/2006-07-22 Michael Behe. Anyone wishing to participate may do so. Thanks. SynergeticMaggot 17:42, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

Um, there's noting to mediate. There is broad consensus among 6-7 long-time contributors to this article, including a number of admins, that the edits sought by ChulaOne (talk · contribs) have no place in the article. Thus this RFMC appears to me to be a frivolous, last-ditch effort by a troublesome editor to force in their NPOV-challenged edits that have failed to make consensus. I suggest that ChulaOne learn to start abiding by consensus and stop wasting other's time here. FeloniousMonk 18:58, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

Agree with FM. ChulaOne has not made any concrete attempt to discuss the desired changes. In addition, it's a little strange that s/he asks for help resolving a dispute almost two weeks after abandoning the issue. Guettarda 19:18, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

All that appears above, plus the edit summaries on the article history page, beg to differ with whatever "consensus" Guettarda imagines to exist. All I'm asking for here is a fair presentation--and allowing readers to make their own judgments on Behe and his ideas. ChulaOne

In an effort to help out, I'd also like to know where this consensus lies. Does anyone object to a survey? SynergeticMaggot 19:44, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

Well, I didn't rv any of ChulaOne's edits, but looking them over, I would have had I seen them before Guettarda; they are factually inaccurate. Furthermore, "allowing readers to make their own judgments on Behe and his ideas" is no different than pushing the Discovery Institute's/Behe's pov, as their strategy takes the form of calling their idea, ID, science among non-scientists, but is in fact rejected by the vast majority of real scientists. Presenting such a thoroughly rejected concept as equally plausible to established science violates WP:NPOV#Undue weight. FeloniousMonk 19:54, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

I'm inclined to strongly agree with FM and Guettarda here. Certainly Chula has made little or no effort to discuss his proposed changes. At present there seems to be a strong consensus about what this should look like. If Chula wants to discuss the matter here in talk, that seems reasonable, and I would listen to that, but as far as I can tell, Chula has made no signifigant attempt to do so. Mediation is premature. JoshuaZ 20:06, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

Yes, I have a problem with a survey. It isn't appropriate to use a survey to determine whether Plumbago should edit the Ann Coulter page (which is the only concrete suggestion I see from ChulaOne. Guettarda 20:07, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

I'm sorry, did I give the impression that this survey was for another article? What Ann Coulter's article has to do in conjuction with this article has not been expressed to me. The survey was suggested in order to find consensus amoung the editors on this page. I've been notified of a 6-7 consensus of experienced editors, yet I have seen no survey to substantiate this. Guettarda, if you do not wish to participate in a survey, you don't have to. SynergeticMaggot 20:14, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

My comments refer to ChulaOne's comments on the talk page. The only valid poll based on her/his mediation request would refer to her/his suggestions here. The only concrete suggestion he has made on this page is that Plumbago should edit the AC article. It's inappropriate to run a poll as to whether Plumbago should edit the AC page. Is there some other issue that s/he has tried to discuss? I see insults and one suggestion. Presumably you aren't suggesting we have a poll based on her/his insults? Guettarda 20:21, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

Guettarda is refering to ChulaOne's trollish aside to Plumbago to go edit the Ann Coulter article. I think a poll is unnecessary; we've already seen comments supporting the long-standing content of this article from Guettarda, JoshuaZ, and myself. Taken with the evidence of the other editor who reverted ChulaOne, Plumbago, that makes four against, and the three other long-term contributors here are not likely going to support ChulaOne's changes for the reasons already given. But if you need a straw poll, please feel free. FeloniousMonk 20:27, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

Honestly, I still don't know what the issue is here. A poll on what precisely? Whether it's ok to have misleading language in Wikipedia articles? Guettarda 20:31, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

Besides, any "survey", "poll" or other form of voting on whether "information" that violates WP:V, WP:RS and WP:NPOV should be allowed to be presented in the article seem pretty silly to me. If we have a poll on the Solar system article that shows that 8 of 10 editors think the solar system is geocentric rather than heliocentric should we report that as fact instead of what has been proven by science? Isn't the suggestion for a survey here much along those lines? &#0149;Jim62sch&#0149; 21:09, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

It appears the mediator has investigated and found no cause for mediation[2]. Move along, nothing to see here. KillerChihuahua^?!? 21:20, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

Yes, that explains why his call for a poll was after he found no cause for mediation. &#0149;Jim62sch&#0149; 21:53, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

I'm suggesting a poll be taken as to the consensus which was purported. I think I made that clear already. I'm neither supporting nor disputing anyones actions, nor will I.

FM states here as well as in this thread, that there is a broad consensus among 6-7 long-time contributors to this article, including a number of admins. After browsing through this talk page, I did not see any form of poll/survey to verify this. No one is asking for a poll to violate policies.

KillerChihuahua: Of course, one can only mediate between the willing. It appears I'm of no service here so I bid you adieux :) SynergeticMaggot 23:14, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

SynergeticMaggot: I put it to you that my opponents have, in the short span of just one evening, more than adequately demonstrated why the Behe article is so wanting and why, indeed, mediation is necessary. ChulaOne 02:51, 23 July 2006 (UTC)

I'm not sure of your comment, could you please clarify? Is it a statement or a question? Because if I understand you right, you seem to be saying that the other contributors are the ones showing a need for mediation. While I will not comment on this, I will merely only state again that I cannot force anyone to participate. SynergeticMaggot 03:14, 23 July 2006 (UTC)

And I put it to ChulaOne: Are you here to write an accurate article, or to counterbalance those who edit here? If the former, welcome and please state what you think needs to change and why, if the latter, WP:RULES provides no provision for that sort of advocacy, but you'll find ResearchID.org welcomes it. Every significant article on Wikipedia represents the efforts of many contributors, and this article is no exception. The onus is on you, indeed each of us, to make a case for your changes to the article if they are challenged; something you have utterly failed not only to do, but to attempt, vague and not so vague accusations and a premature attempt at mediation not withstanding. FeloniousMonk 03:43, 23 July 2006 (UTC)

My argument with editions of this article has always revolved around the heavy-handed way in which Behe is treated in our supposedly NPOV publication. ChulaOne 13:41, 23 July 2006 (UTC)

Er, what arguments? You have made arguments? No, you have complained about the article and insulted people. Guettarda 14:59, 23 July 2006 (UTC)

FYI for ChulaOne, regarding this edit [3] which s/he described as "NPOV edits which are fair to all sides. Controversy section a more fitting venue for arguments pro and con." The Wikipedia guidelines for writing articles WP:IA#Writing state about intros "Start your article with a concise lead section or introduction defining the topic at hand and mentioning the most important points. The reader should be able to get a good overview by only reading the lead..." So your notion that shuffling off how Behe is viewed by the scientific community from the intro to a controversy section is misbegotten. Please try to become more familiar with the proper way articles are written here, you can start at WP:MOS. FeloniousMonk 15:53, 23 July 2006 (UTC)

To be more clear on this, try WP:LEAD and WP:LIVING, ChulaOne. SynergeticMaggot 16:25, 23 July 2006 (UTC)

SynergeticMaggot: It's apparent that Guettarda and friends will continue to scuttle any attempts by me or anyone else(?) to rewrite this article, or even its intro, in NPOV prose. If Wikipedia has the will and an eye to its reputation ... the ball is in your court! ChulaOne 19:34, 23 July 2006 (UTC)

Now that the MC-case is closed I'll be able to discuss this more openly. The article needs alot of work, but you do not seem to be helping it out at all. Removing cited statements is not rewriting. Please review these pages if you honestly wish to contribute: WP:LIVING, WP:BIO, WP:NOR, WP:V, WP:RS and WP:NN. SynergeticMaggot 19:43, 23 July 2006 (UTC)

Flow of the article

Anyone want to tell me where Michael Behe's bio is? This seems to be a storehouse for his theories or work, which appear to have its own article. SynergeticMaggot 16:56, 23 July 2006 (UTC)

The academics section covers his education pretty well. FeloniousMonk 17:34, 24 July 2006 (UTC)

They dont really cover anything "pretty well". Need to expand that part significantly. Ansell 01:10, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

Well, after a week of serious searching for Behe biography material beyond what we have here, I've come up with nothing. Maybe you'll have better luck. FeloniousMonk 16:44, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

Biased

This entry is way too biased against Michael Behe and needs to be revised. 75.3.48.37 04:43, 26 July 2006 (UTC)

Do you have specific points that you consider to be biased? JoshuaZ 05:04, 26 July 2006 (UTC)

This article contains more sources opposing Behe than supporting him. In the article introduction it only uses sources opposing Behe. It should also use sources that support him. The stuff that opposes him should not be in the introduction if you won't put anything in there supporting him. 75.2.253.161 20:13, 26 July 2006 (UTC)

What credible scientific sources support Behe? Guettarda 20:40, 26 July 2006 (UTC)

Sources you consider credible? probably none, because you are biased and this article is biased.

You are the person who decides what source is credible, so you decide only sources that favor your side are credible. 75.2.253.161 04:31, 27 July 2006 (UTC)

Simple question. Are you aware of any credible scientific sources that support Behe? If you do, please share your discoveries. If you don't, then what's your point? Guettarda 05:53, 27 July 2006 (UTC)

As Guettarda says, where are your sources? Behe presents his ideas as science and, as such, for them to be taken seriously they need to survive scientific scrutiny. That he has not managed to publish them in an appropriate scientific forum speaks volumes about the quality of these ideas (if you are prepared to listen). But if you can find something in the literature that I've missed, please go ahead and cite it. --Plumbago 07:51, 27 July 2006 (UTC)

Excellent comment sir.—The preceding unsigned comment was added by 75.8.106.226 (talk • contribs) .

My feeling is that devoting two huge passages to controversy about the person, while not sufficiently explaining his contributions, is inherently biased. The article also contains "colourful language" and weasel words (although they could possibly be referenced). As it is the article is nowhere near NPOV. The guy is known as a founder of a movement, why devote so much effort to "exposing" him as being pseudo-scientific, why not do that on the page for Intelligent Design, even though that is possibly already the case. Wikipedia is not here to favour the "scientific community". It is here to put forward arguments compiled from secondary sources neutrally. The content distribution of the article in no way does this. Ansell 01:02, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

Feel free to expand on Behe's position if you really feel it is inadequately explained here. As to how much real estate is devoted to the response of the scientific community to his polemics, it is well within the bounds described WP:NPOV.

WP:NPOV says that both sides of a debate must be presented, opening the door for the viewpoint of the scientific community's reception of ID's claim of being legitimate science. Since the scientific community rejects that claim and says ID is pseudoscience, NPOV: Pseudoscience tells us "The task before us is not to describe disputes as though, for example, pseudoscience were on a par with science; rather, the task is to represent the majority (scientific) view as the majority view and the minority (sometimes pseudoscientific) view as the minority view; and, moreover, to explain how scientists have received pseudoscientific theories. This is all in the purview of the task of describing a dispute fairly."

So ID proponents claim ID is valid science on par with evolutionary theory, and the scientific community rejects that claim. That makes ID the minority view. NPOV: Giving "equal validity" says "Please be clear on one thing: the Wikipedia neutrality policy certainly does not state, or imply, that we must "give equal validity" to minority views. It does state that we must not take a stand on them as encyclopedia writers; but that does not stop us from describing the majority views as such; from fairly explaining the strong arguments against the pseudoscientific theory..."

As to how much article space it dedicated to the two opposing viewpoints, NPOV: Undue weight says "Articles that compare views need not give minority views as much or as detailed a description as more popular views..." Finally, NPOV: Making necessary assumptions on "What about the case where, in order to write any of a long series of articles on some general subject, we must make some controversial assumptions? That's the case, e.g., in writing about evolution. Surely we won't have to hash out the evolution-vs.-creationism debate on every such page?" tells us "No, surely not. There are virtually no topics that could proceed without making some assumptions that someone would find controversial. This is true not only in evolutionary biology, but also in philosophy, history, physics, etc." FeloniousMonk 04:39, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

Hey everybody, thanks for all the meticulous work - I've been reading the discussion page with interest. Can I say, though, that I agree that assertions about majority scientific view should be documented by some sort of survey. And, in discussing science, the only sort of survey that actually makes sense is to look at the published literature on a topic and see what scientists are saying. One common tool that scientists use to do this is a database such as (the commonly used) Science Citation Index. The number of citations a concept or author has in the peer-reviewed literature is a measure of the scientific validity of a scientist's work, or the scientific validity of a concept. If a theory is discussed a lot, it's obviously a scientific concept because it can be studied scientifically, and the work is worth talking about. Obviously (or maybe not to some people) theories come and go, but one practical characterisation of science is that science is what scientists do... (if peer-review, or the Scientific Citation Index are foreign concepts to you, do your homework - it's impossible to understand science without knowing how we establish the validity of people's work.) So, I went into SCI, restricted the search from 2001 until now, and had a look to see if there's any scientific debate on ID (term search: "Intelligent Design") relative to the number of articles in the same period published on evolution. I also looked at MJ Behe's publication record regarding evolution in the same period and the number of times he's been cited (you need a good publication record and citation record to get a job in science). First, only a single peer-reviewed research paper on ID has been published by Behe in the last 5 years (or ever) (MJ Behe, Protein Science, 2004), and was cited only 8 times - several of which were direct refutations (cf M Lynch, Protein Science 2005; C Adami, Science 2006) and only one of which might be construed as positive (complaining about the overreliance of Darwinian methodology in designing novel enzymes in biochemistry, and proposing that biochemists should use more design-y methods - Leisola M, Turunen O, APPLIED MICROBIOLOGY AND BIOTECHNOLOGY 75 (6): 1225-1232 JUL 2007). Take my word for it, with this record, he would never get hired to teach ID at any accredited university, even if accredited universities were in the habit of teaching ID.

"Intelligent design", as a search term, came up 269 times from 2001 onwards, and in only 1 case could I not verify that the articles were either: articles claiming to have debunked ID, articles discussing de novo design of proteins in the lab, using ID as a tongue-in-cheek term, editorials about ID (vastly against ID), using ID as a tongue-in-cheek term to discuss the evolution of scientific practices or computer algorithms, articles about the philosophy of ID vs Evolution and diatribes against ID, the design of tailored immunotherapy treatments, materials science articles.... The single exception was the aforementioned article by Behe. Irreducible complexity (12 refs) didn't fare much better, apart from a couple of mathematical articles that were about chaotic systems and a Russian article which may have been relevant (but I couldn't understand). In context, evolution was referenced >10 000 times (it stopped counting) in the same time period, evolution AND genetics were referenced 3357 times, evolution AND ecology 2935 times, evolution AND "natural selection" 2662 times... I could go on. And on. And on. So, not only has ID as a concept (sensu Behe) not caught on in any field of biology, but it hasn't caught on in physics or any other field of 'non-Darwinian' science - except as an amusing catchphrase. Neither has irreducible complexity. So, IMHO, it's fair to say that ID is NOT science, and the article on Behe, as it stands, is not biased. Bar fly high 02:58, 31 August 2007 (UTC)

Here's a shorter version in plain language - Behe is a fucking quack and no one other than fellow IDCreationist crackpots support or even quote his "work". Someone mentioned Behe's "contribution" What contribution would that be? He's contributed to the field of psuedoscience, true, and crackpottery and crankdom of course. What else has he contributed to? Oh, ignorance, yes he's leading that charge indeed. What else has he contributed? A couple of false "theories" yes yes. What else? The upside to Behe and his kind is that my children will never go to a public school. Instead we're sending them to provate school where intelligent design creationism and isn't given 2 seconds and there are no dishonest, sneaky, perverted, christian fundy intelligent design creationism school board psychos to deal with. So, I guess Behe has made a contribution. I'm making sure my children get a better than public education. Thanks Behe!

Should I bother editing this article

Seeing as every one of my edits were just reverted, what is actually going to enthuse me to do anything on this article. I do not want to edit war, which is why I am bringing the issues, flatly rejected in the total revert, here.

1. "Multiple cites are to different docs and necessary due to constant stream of challenges" How are the huge number of citations and direct links to each citation worth it. The report is a single document and should be referenced as such. Possibly noting down the page numbers with a single link to the document would be nicer looking but currently it looks like overkill.
2. (I/i)ntelligent (D/d)esign : Could not find the evidence for this from a quick look at the talk page and a few archives. 30 archives is a lot of stuff to go through so a pointer for this one would be handy. I personally think from the discussion points on the first archive that Behe is using the design under the Theory bannerhead and not under what has been said to be religion with a new face.
3. "Coulter devotes approximately one-third of the book to polemical attacks on evolution, which she terms "Darwinism": How is this relevant, or verifiable. The statement is a personal commentary on the work and as such is not verifiable just be looking at the book. Referring to someone as making "polemical attacks" is a subjective thing by nature. Need to find a commentator otherwise it is original research.
4. Weasel word {{citationneeded}} markers. There are sentences that are not referenced at all. The entirety of the markers that I inserted were removed without referring to any one of the "many" people/evidence in each case.

Reverting the totality of good faith edits is rude IMO. If anyone wants to incorporate these concerns it would be most appreciated. Ansell 02:35, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

1. Multiple cites are indeed necessary due to constant stream of challenges here and provide the reader a service as well. You should read them, as a lot of your questions here would be answered by them. The Dover ruling is not a single document at Wikisource. Can the supporting cites be as incomplete as you claim yet be overkill?
2. Upper case vs lower case was discussed at length and settled a long time ago by long term contributors at Talk:Intelligent design; the final outcome was that intelligent design would be lower case throughout ID-related articles. This is due to the theory that ID seeks to supplant, the theory of evolution, evolutionary theory, is not commonly capitalized. It was covered here: Talk:Intelligent_design/Archive23#Renaming_Intelligent_design_as_Intelligent_Design No doubt Behe claims intelligent design is a theory he's said as much many times. But in the Dover trial he's admitted belief in ID is correlated and coupled to belief in God. That's all beside the point in relation to upper case vs lower case, since the competing theories are generally not capitalized.
3. Coulter is relevant because since Dover Behe, Dembski et al have been reduced to reduced to coaching pundits like Ann Coulter since high school science classrooms are not as likely as they were beforehand. The statement is not a personal commentary; it's easily verifiable by looking at the book and there's no shortage of sources. [4] [5] [6] That Coulter's book is an attack on evolution is a simple statement of fact. Her writing on the topic is the very definition of "polemical" and not subjective at all.
4. Your very post serves to show why there is a need for as many cites as there are in this article. Sources will be added for each of the statements where you called for one. Just don't call it overkill. FeloniousMonk 04:04, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

Thanks, the only part I was calling overkill was the multiple cites to what looks to me to be one court ruling, even though it is paginated on wikisource. I was not meaning overall that citations were overkill. I disagree with the reasoning being lower case but this is not the place to take it up. Ansell 06:47, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

No problem. The cites you requested have been added. FeloniousMonk 16:24, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

Onion article

The article currently includes a reference to an article by the Onion concerning a "rogue scientist" from Lehigh University. While it wouldn't surprise me that the use of Lehigh by the Onion writers was meant as a reference to Behe (it's the first thing that came to my mind when I originally read it), it's just not clear enough for WP (to my mind). Aside from the Lehigh reference, there's nothing else in the Onion article that ties the "rogue scientist" to Behe. Yes, it does discuss lots of pseudoscientific theories, but none of them are creationist pseudoscience. Further, the scientist in question is even a chemist rather than a biologist. If the Onion really wished to do a hatchet job on Behe (I can dream ...), he's more than provided them with enough ammunition over the years to do a proper job. This isn't it, and I believe should be removed. Cheers, --Plumbago 12:11, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

Well, with regards to the "chemist vs. biologist" issue, a biochemist is more of a chemist than a biologist. Guettarda 12:14, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

Well-spotted Guettarda!  :-) Still, even easier then for the Onion to have tweaked the article to make it a more straightforward satire on Behe. --Plumbago 12:38, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

I'd say it pretty clearly spoofs Behe. But whether that's clear enough to belong in the article - I'm not sure. Guettarda 12:54, 11 October 2006 (UTC)

Dr. Behe & Lehigh University

I was curious if Dr. Behe has had any trouble with the administration of Lehigh University. From the evidence, it seems not, aside from the entirely blunt disclaimer of his views provided by his department.

This is actually a bit surprising, since universities can be take "intellectual correctness" to extremes -- but it certainly it reflects on the whole "academic freedom" issue relative to ID. The disclaimer also defended Dr. Behe's rights to express a minority opinion.

I'll have to similarly check on Philip Johnson -- I mean, the guy's from UC Berkeley! Then again, the law department isn't likely to get as upset as the science department would be.

MrG (27 Nov 06)

They think he's a crank, (well duh). [7], though funding for him won't be a problem. If they sacked him though, no doubt he'd throw a carefully orchestrated and govrenment-endorsed temper tantrum like Richard Sternberg. Humps 14:20, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

Heh! Sternberg didn't even get sacked, his own CV said he stayed with the NIH and the Smithsonian up to 2007, and he'd quit his editor job before the controversy over it erupted. MrG 4.225.210.106 (talk) 15:20, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

Bias

Like most articles concerning Intelligent Design on Wikipedia, this article is so biased against Michael Behe it is disgusting. You should all be ashamed of yourselves. No wonder nobody takes Wikipedia seriously, you can't even cite Wikipedia as a source in college papers. —Preceding unsigned comment added by JBrownHrvd (talk • contribs)

Do you have specific issues in this article that you think need to be addressed? Also note about the citation matter, you shouldn't be able to cite Wikipedia as a source in college papers just as you shouldn't cite any encyclopedia as a source in a college paper. Wikipedia aims to be a general reference with accurate information but for anyone doing serious research Wikipedia should be used at most as a guide on issues or as direction for where to find resources. JoshuaZ 02:20, 30 November 2006 (UTC)

I'm not so sure you can label Behe's work as pseudoscience. It's fine to have references to people who claim his work is pseudoscience, but you have no right to act as if there has been some kind of a verdict that says his work his garbage. For all you or I know it could be true. I'm an agnostic about whether or not there could be design in human biology. I want this article to be balanced. [User:JBrownHrvd|JBrownHrvd]] 02:40, 30 November 2006 (UTC)

We haven't labeled his work as pseudoscience. He is involved in a subject that is considered by the scientific community to be pseudoscience. Wikipedia is about verifiability not truth. In this case we have multiple reliable sources calling his work pseudoscience. It is thus described that way here and including on the list of subjects related to pseudoscience. JoshuaZ 02:33, 30 November 2006 (UTC)

Please read our core policy, WP:NPOV. It says "The neutral point of view is a means of dealing with conflicting views. The policy requires that, where there are or have been conflicting views, these should be presented fairly. None of the views should be given undue weight or asserted as being the truth, and all significant published points of view are to be presented, not just the most popular one. It should also not be asserted that the most popular view or some sort of intermediate view among the different views is the correct one. Readers are left to form their own opinions." Wikipedia:Neutral_point_of_view/FAQ#Pseudoscience tells us "The task before us is not to describe disputes as though, for example, pseudoscience were on a par with science; rather, the task is to represent the majority (scientific) view as the majority view and the minority (sometimes pseudoscientific) view as the minority view; and, moreover, to explain how scientists have received pseudoscientific theories. This is all in the purview of the task of describing a dispute fairly." FeloniousMonk 06:59, 30 November 2006 (UTC)

You should probably read WP:3RR too. FeloniousMonk 07:02, 30

November 2006 (UTC)

feloniousmonk, I have removed the term psuedoscience from the article as this is most definately a point of view. It is best to be honest when speaking to others to be taken seriously. The word psuedo was taken from the greek word, which means to lie. Science is looking for answers based on data. What evolutionist have done (which you obviously embrace) is to arrogantly label anyone who disagrees with a naturalistic point of view a liar. This is what you, or whoever attached this word, are implying. The majority of Americans overwhelmingly disagree with a naturalistic point of view. What you seek to do is remove logic from science. Behe simply looked at the data and said that information is needed in any system for the production of ordered regeneration. Please read the laws of thermodynamics. He simply followed the logical conclusion. Again, your "majority scientific view" is, of a truth, the "majority evolution view" and means nothing to me. User:Isuse33

And I've restored it. The content stating that the scientific community says ID is pseudoscience is properly sourced and attributed, so your claim of bias is baseless. The public does not determine what is and isn't pseudoscience, the scientific community does, and the scientific community says ID and IC are pseudoscience as the sources here and at the ID prove. Our core content policy provides specifically for covering pseudoscience: WP:NPOVFAQ#Pseudoscience It says "The task before us is not to describe disputes as though, for example, pseudoscience were on a par with science; rather, the task is to represent the majority (scientific) view as the majority view and the minority (sometimes pseudoscientific) view as the minority view; and, moreover, to explain how scientists have received pseudoscientific theories. This is all in the purview of the task of describing a dispute fairly." Your removal of the content and your reasoning for it given here are not supported by WP:NPOV, and hence not going to fly. FeloniousMonk 05:34, 2 January 2007 (UTC)

feloniousmonk, I have again removed the term psuedoscience from the article as this is most definately a point of view. You have ignored my arguement, and it is clear you have an axe to grind. The other editors you have obviously bullied are right. Your point on psuedoscience is a point of view. Evolution is pseudoscience. Again, you should reference the laws of thermodynamics. These are laws, not theories, as is evolution. Once again, having a consensus on an issue among those who embrace a naturalistic world view is worthless. You and other evolutionist don't make the rules up as you go. I harken back to an era where there were other bullies who claimed that the earth was the center of the solar system. That was the majority view at the time. To reference your quote "and the minority (sometimes pseudoscientific) view as the minority view;" The word "sometimes" sould be heeded here. Minority views are sometimes right. The truth is that fear reigns, and not honest inquiry in the so called "scientific community". I'm not afraid, feloniousmonk, nor will I be bullied by you or anyone else. isuse33

Whether or not people have an axe to gring is irrelevant, you continue to remove well cited and supported information in the article that complies with Wiki policy. You have been given links that explain the Wiki policy on this subject. If you are unhappy that science considers IC and ID pseudoscience then take up your arguments with the science community and not Wiki editors. Mr Christopher 16:24, 2 January 2007 (UTC)

isuse33, you'd also be wise to familiarize yourself with WP:3RR. You're about to violate it which could result in a 24 hour ban from this article. I'm leaving a similar message on your talk page. Mr Christopher 16:31, 2 January 2007 (UTC)

Mr. Christopher, thanks for the note. I would like to take you to task on this point, sir. To give a couple of cites that state some opinions of a few so called scientist who speak on behalf of the entire community, is preposterous and indeed bias. Isaac Newton and Albert Einstein both embraced ID (yes, do your homework) and were bold in their proclamation of it. Are you prepared to go to their pages and declare them psuedoscientist? It's not a question of a minority view. It's a question of arrogance and sensorship. It's very easy to call something a mojority view don't you think if you only consider scientist to be those who hold your world view? So is it everything in Wikipedia, must be judged by you and those who think like you? You determine who is a scientist and who is not. If Behe is not, then Einstein is not, Newton is not. You have a problem on your hands Mr. Christopher. The problem is one of honesty. User:isuse33

Hmmm...so how did Newton and Einstein embrace a "theory" that dates to the 1980s? Yeah. Where are you getting your "facts" from - The Onion? Guettarda 05:00, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

ID didn't start in the 80's, it was simply given a name when Behe and others came on the scene. You might want to read more than the Onion, Guettarda. Look up Einstein and Newton in reference to origins. It's amazing what you learn when you actually read, instead of licking your fingure and sticking it to the wind to see where the crowd is going. User:isuse33

And the source for this? The idea starts with Johnson, was built upon by Behe and Dembski, and marketed by the Discovery Institute's millions. Sure, some of it is recycled from Paley and others, but (a) that isn't "intelligent design", (b) Paley was born after Newton died, and (c) Einstein is barely a theist; there's no evidence to suggest that he subscribed to Paley's ideas (which were largely forgotten between Darwin and Behe) or any other anti-scientific ideas. "It's amazing what you learn when you actually read" - I applaud you on your start, but you need to read reliable sources, and learn to read with some critical discernment. Guettarda 16:12, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for the note, Ruettarda. The idea of an intelligent designer of the universe is as old as the hills. There are a billion Muslims in the world (many scientist among them)

who believe in an intelligent designer. Jews have believed the same for years. Isaac Newton was a man who saw science as an act of worship to the God he believed created the universe. This is something you can read from his own writings. Einstein also wrote of an itelligent designer. Oh, but they are psuedoscientist because they don't see everthing from your point of view. Put down your copy of Mother Jones and maybe you can learn to read with a little discernment. User:Isuse33

Obviously you seriously misunderstand the topic. Try contributing to topics you know more about, and remember the key policies on verifiability, neutrality and civility. Guettarda 02:58, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

I know alot about the topic. Obviously, you only read scources that support your ignorance. As for civility, you can back up and read the beggining of this conflict in your comment "where did you get your "facts" the "Onion" If you don't even know that Einstein and Newton were perponents of the idea of ID, you obviously don't know much about the subject or read history. And stop sending me messages. I have reported you to Wikipedia for your lack of neutrality and civility after ChulaOne, Ansell, JBraunHrvd and I repeatedly said the "psuedoscience" comment is bias. And please do some reading before you comment again on a subject you know so little about. isuse33

(ri)Instead of foaming at the mouth like a demented cur in the estrus of rapturous delusion, perhaps you might wish to wipe the pietistic slaver from your Cerberean muzzle and prove your assertions regarding Newton and Einstein -- if you can. I'm not talking of the drivel you wrote above -- Newton's theology hardly qualifies as proof of anything other than his belief in standard, run-of-the-mill creationism (yawn), and Einstein's purported writing "of an itelligent [sic] designer" is no doubt something that you misunderstood (shock of all shocks) in your quest for "revealed" knowledge.

(PS. Don't quote the famous "God does not play dice with the universe".-- that had a meaning quite other than what a literalist/probable inerrantist would take at face value.) &#0149;Jim62sch&#0149; 09:58, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

The time I played dice with God, His were loaded.Mzmadmike 18:02, 19 April 2007 (UTC)

You want a citation for the claim on Einstein. Here it is:

http://leiwen.tripod.com/worldisi.htm

Pay specific attention to the final paragraph and the word "Reason." Sounds quite convincing to me. 85.212.149.159sliponshoe

Newton also dabbled in alchemy, and Einstein never accepted quantum mechanics. What's your point? So far, you've tried argument from authority, argument from popular belief, argument from repression and conspiracy, argument from ignorance and argument from blather. None of this is going to make ID into science. It's pseudoscience, because the people who define science say so. Islam defines Christ as a prophet, and there are more Muslims than Christians, who have written more books on the subject. Therefore, Christ is only a prophet, not a savior. Happy now?Mzmadmike 17:53, 19 April 2007 (UTC)

is 68.34.43.127 also User:Isuse33?

according to edit history there are one in the same and keep reverting the same info over and over after having been given explanations as to why those edits are wrong. This can only be considered vandalism at this point. Mr Christopher 23:02, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

Mr. Christopher, you are right, please ask the perpatrator to stop immediately. Several of us have asked the phrase "psuedoscience" to be removed since it is bias. I am not the only one. Obviously you are one of the people doing it, so stop it. Stop ramming your opinion down our throats. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Isuse33 (talk • contribs).

Mr. Christopher, in the interest of truth, consider these people, ChulaOne, Ansell, JBrawnHrvd, and myself, Isuse33. All have expressed the fact that this article is bias! FeloniousMonk, and Guettarda have continued to bully all of these people. You decide. just go back and read. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Isuse33 (talk • contribs).

The assertion that ID is actually pseudo science is not within our purview to decide--but by the same token, the article does not say "ID is pseudoscience." the assertion that ID is considered pseudoscience by the mainstream scientific community is certainly verifiable, notable, and unbiased--and that is what the article says. Claiming that it is "biased" to report on the mainstream scientific consensus is blatantly incorrect. Justin Eiler 03:29, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

Justin, thanks for your note. If you will read the comments I have already made, you will see that you are incorrect. Four of us, ChulaOne, Ansell, JBrounHvrd and I all have commented that this is bias. Please consider this. Unless you take a poll and ask every scientist if they consider it pseudoscince, you cannot state this. you can say "there are many EVOLUTIONISTS who consider it pseudoscience. The whole discussion page is full of people saying that it is bias. And it is most certainly not verifiable. I have reported the problem to Wikipedia. Please stop reverting my deletion of this bias statement. Isuse33

Isuse, it does not matter if every single editor of Wikipedia offers the opinion that an assertion is biased--bias is not decided by opinion, but by accuracy to facts. Behe's views are clearly and accurately represented--so are the views of the mainstream scientific community. This is not "bias"--this fulfills the requirements of WP:NPOV. Continued reversion to a non-NPOV version will result in censure. Justin Eiler 05:09, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

Justine, you are not hearing my argument. For someone to state that the "mainstream" makes a specific statement ie "pseudoscientific" there would need to be a poll taken. This has not happened. As I stated before, Einstein and Newton both stated they held to the idea of ID. Are you prepared to call them pseudoscientist? Is the "mainstream" ready to do that?

You obviously don't know what you are talking about. As for censure, that's what evolutionist are doing, as did those who thought that the earth was the center of our solar system. I have already reported this problem with you and Guetarrda to the powers that be. Stop making statements that are not verifiable. That statement is not. I don't care who you quote, it can't be proven. User:Isuse33

And you, Isuse33, continue to disregard Wikipedia policies (while acting like a little girl) and you claim you are being victimized. Grow up. Stop removing cited, supported pieces of the article that you do not like. Mr Christopher 13:08, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

That's unfair to little girls. Guettarda 15:57, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

That's easy for YOU to say, you have the latest issue of Mother Jones. Mr Christopher 16:03, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

No, I don't have it - I was reading it at my father-in-law's over Christmas though, and after reading their articles on hypermiling, Lou Dobbs and Hillary Clinton-hating, I'm hooked. Guettarda 16:10, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

Lou Dobbs is cool, I'm going to have to get a MJ subscription! Mr Christopher 16:13, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

Univ. of Lehigh statement mis-characterized - again

The statement from the University of Lehigh states specificially:

It is our collective position that intelligent design has no basis in science, has not been tested experimentally, and should not be regarded as scientific.

Thus the line:

Behe's claims about the irreducible complexity of key cellular structures are strongly contested by the scientific community, including his own department, the Department of Biological Sciences, at Lehigh University.[2]

is mis-leading.

It is only "intelligent design" that the department feels should not be "regarded as scientific", they say absolutely nothing about irreducible complexity.

I corrected this last year sometime. It is really very simple....the published statement says what it says and can simply be quoted....what's so hard about that?

As it stands, the footnote, which appears to be the source materials for the entire line and represent the "scientific community" doesn't even accurately reflect the opinion of his university's department.

I will edit this again, and hope that this simple point can be well taken. I will leave in the unsourced assertion, now without attribution, that "Behe's claims about the irreducible complexity of key cellular structures are strongly contested by the scientific community".

Note that reverting the correction of a demonstrated misquote is a serious Wiki offence.

KipHansen 20:03, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

I note that Behe's own page on the Lehigh site states the following: "My ideas about irreducible complexity and intelligent design are entirely my own. They certainly are not in any sense endorsed by either Lehigh University in general or the Department of Biological Sciences in particular. In fact, most of my colleagues in the Department strongly disagree with them." Blackmetalbaz 20:21, 2 July 2007 (UTC)

ZZZZZZZZZ.... Irreducible complexity as argued by Behe is an argument for intelligent design. Meaning whatever his department says about Behe and ID will apply to his unique notions supporting it as well. Odd nature 22:08, 2 July 2007 (UTC)

That dosn't follow. A: The reason the Queen has two heads, is that the sun shone yesterday. B: The Queen doesn't have two heads. Nevertheless, you are right that the sun shone yesterday. Thehalfone 09:53, 18 July 2007 (UTC)

This article has been tainted by enuendo and 'weasel words'. 

Dr.Behe has a DOCTORATE in biochemestry and is at the better for making a claim in Biochemestry as he does. Now, how many of you have ever read about his theory or work, etc.? NPOV is clearly being violated and this article is not being treated in a fair way, I propose that the article be cleaned up to reattain nuetrality and/or 'unbiasedness'. Also there is a growing dissent in the Darwinian debate, if you actually care to research the topic, and as such a well-qualified person, such as Dr. Behe should be free to make a scientific claim without it being called 'pseudoscience', as a matter of course, where is the nuetrality in that? As a final note, you people write about the 'belief' in Darwinism, I think that is a very nice understatement. 70.136.41.84 17:41, 22 October 2007 (UTC)Theodore in California, who is thinking clearly without the use of any type of drug.

Ignore. OrangeMarlin ^{Talk• Contributions} 18:17, 22 October 2007 (UTC)

NPOV on Ann Coulter

It isn't OK, Felonious Monk, to revert an edit simply because you disagree, even if you're right. That's for vandalisms, and severe damage. Look up "revert" to see Wikipedia guidelines.

Your consideration of NPOV as "weasel words" is not consistent with Wikipedia format -- if that's weasel words, we like weasel words here. The wording I corrected was ungrammatical; it put quotes around "tutored" for something that was clearly instruction, whether right or wrong; and Darwinism isn't Ann Coulter's term -- see the Wikipedia entry of that name.

As it happens, I agree with the opinion you're putting into the article. Behe is wrong. But Wikipedia articles are not meant to include bias, even correct bias.

psuedoscientist vs psuedoscience

Much arguing here can be avoided by accepting that no one always practices his/her craft perfectly. Psuedoscience can be committed by any competent scientist on occasion. Aside from ID, I'll wager that Mr Behe has done some work that meets the standards of his peers. The insulting term `psuedoscientist' should be avoided entirely. Moreover, something doesn't become scientific fact just because an icon (eg, Einstein, Newton) said so. Arguments should be valid based only on their objective merits rather than the company they keep. It strikes me as NPOV to label ID as psuedoscience, yet still consider Mr Behe a scientist. Twslandlord 23:15, 15 February 2007 (UTC)twslandlord

Behe's scientific output since joining the ID movement has been vanishingly small. His main activity appears to be the promotion of the pseudoscience of ID. This would justify calling him a pseudoscientist. Hrafn42 22:30, 26 April 2007 (UTC)

Hrafn42, sorry, I do not see the logic in this. Stephen Gould, Julian Huxley, Richard Dawkins, et al also promote evolution. According to Wikipedia, this makes Gould a "public figure" and Huxley a "popularizer" of science and a "public figure". But when they are acting as public figures (promoters), they are not conducting science (or pseudoscience). ImprobabilityDrive 04:39, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

some new? info on something awful;

http://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=2402383 —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 149.135.112.218 (talk) 08:34, 31 March 2007 (UTC).

This looks legit to me. I know the Behes well (I'm best friends with one of them.) and will check it out to make sure it is actually a Behe doing this. I will let you know when I get a chance. But until then don't use anything from the site. Of course, if this doesn't meet guidelines on Wikipedia, it doesn't much matter. Who knows the guidelines for a situation like this? N i g h t F a l c o n 9 0 9 0 9' ^{T a l k} 01:58, 1 April 2007 (UTC)

In any event, this is not reliable and not notable. JoshuaZ 14:27, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Well it was legit but I have nothing to prove that. There was nothing really new there anyway. N i g h t F a l c o n 9 0 9 0 9' ^{T a l k} 15:14, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Ian Musgrave's blog at Panda's Thumb as source

Current sentence: "Coulter devotes approximately one-third of the book to polemical attacks on evolution, which she terms "Darwinism".<ref>http://www.pandasthumb.org/archives/2006/06/anne_coulter_cl_1.html</ref>"

Problems with this sentence and reference.

1. The reference says "creos" use the term "Darwinism". I did not find any mention of Coulter using the term at the reference cited.
2. The reference turned up no hits for a text search of the terms "third" or "1/3" or "percent".
3. Likewise, the term "polemical" and "polemic" do not appear in the reference, to the best of my searching abilities. <b4>4. The wikilink to Ann Coulter's book is sufficient. This is not an article on Ann Coulter's book, but Michael Behe.
5. And, most importantly, the refernce is not disclosed as a blog entry on a evolution advocacy web site in the text of the article, which will become important if somebody can explain how the pandasthumb.org blog entry is related to the sentence to which it is attached as a reference.

Now, technically, the denotation of the term polemic is accurate, and probably does not need a reference. Strictly speaking, the reference (Ian Musgrave) provided to the sentence is also engaged in polemical attacks, only this time on Ann Coulter's book. It seems to me that the terms polemic or polemical might have negative connotations. If true, a netural alternative for "tenacious refutation of the opinions or principles of another" should be found. I have moved the sentence and reference to the talk page pending further discussion. ImprobabilityDrive 04:31, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Almost complete disagreement with your reasoning above. However, the sentence shouldn't be here anyways since this page is about Behe not Coulter's book, so I'm not going to go into detail about problems with the above reasoning. JoshuaZ 14:23, 27 April 2007 (UTC)

Badly sourced claim

As I was browsing through the article I noted the following statement:

Also while under oath, Behe admitted that his simulation modelling of evolution with Snoke had in fact shown that complex biochemical systems requiring multiple interacting parts for the system to function and requiring multiple, consecutive and unpreserved mutations to be fixed in a population could evolve within 20,000 years, even if the parameters of the simulation were rigged to make that outcome as unlikely as possible.[29]

This seemed remarkable to me, so I followed the link to the source: s:Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District/4:Whether ID Is Science#Page 88 of 139. However, as far as I can tell, this source does not support the very strong language used in the article. While I'm no fan of ID, I feel that it is important that statements made on Wikipedia closely follows what is said in the source quoted, especially in a case such as this, where it could be argued that the current wikipedia-text accuses a living person of admitting fraud while under oath.

Maybe I'm misinterpreting the text or the source, but I feel that unless a better source can be given, the above text should be removed from the article. --Tengfred 08:40, 9 July 2007 (UTC)

Yes I have noticed the same thing in the evolution series of articles. In Icons of Evolution there is never an explanation of what the author states. Just criticism. It seems unfair to me. TheBestIsYet 11:41, 9 July 2007 (UTC)

Does this problem stem from the cited legal record not being an actual transcript of what was actually said? The cited record is a summary, rather than verbatim, so one might expect some departures in content. As it happens, the cited legal record does record a somewhat similar point to that currently in the article (i.e. that Behe's work can be used in support of evolutionary theory), but it's fair to say that the detail's different at least, and that the cite might not be the best one. Anyway, can someone help sort this out? Is there a better (more complete?) source available? Cheers, --Plumbago 12:34, 9 July 2007 (UTC)

Can you explain how you see this as deviating from the source? I'm not entirely sure what the problem is. Guettarda 14:13, 9 July 2007 (UTC)

You think the section quoted above accurately describes what is said in the source? The closest the source gets is: "In fact, Professor Behe admitted that the study which forms the basis for the article did not rule out many known evolutionary mechanisms and that the research actually might support evolutionary pathways if a biologically realistic population size were used." There is no mention of any 20,000 years, nor does it say that his simulations actually showed the opposite of what was stated in the article. As Plumbago says, more may have been said in court, but without an actual source to support that, this paragraph is original research at best, and libel at worst. --Tengfred 14:47, 9 July 2007 (UTC)

There are far more civil ways to answer a question: when someone asks you a question they are usually looking for more information. People will be much more willing to help you if you reply to their questions with more information, instead of with insults. Try it sometime. I simply asked what parts of it you considered inadequately sourced. Ok, let me try again: which parts of the statement do you think are adequately sourced by that ruling? If you demand people to go digging through the actual testimony for you, at least tell us exactly what you want sourced. Guettarda 21:42, 9 July 2007 (UTC)

I apologize if I sounded rude. I can't see that any part of the quote above is supported in the source. The source talks about "not ruling out" and "might support", the article says "had in fact shown" and fairly specific claims, that are not mentioned in the source at all. If the source really is the transcript, then that is what needs to be cited. I'd look through it myself, but I have no idea where to find it. Tengfred 10:57, 10 July 2007 (UTC)

Doesn't [i]n fact, Professor Behe admitted that the study which forms the basis for the article did not rule out many known evolutionary mechanisms and that the research actually might support evolutionary pathways if a biologically realistic population size were used support this? Obviously they are both actually referring to what he said in his testimony, and the only thing missing is the 20,000 number. Guettarda 13:16, 10 July 2007 (UTC)

The original diff included a link to the actual testimony on TO, which has the 20,000 number. If you feel it important, feel free to restore that link (although I think the link to the ruling should remain). Guettarda 13:20, 10 July 2007 (UTC)

I don't belive that is support enough. It is as you say obvious that they refer to the same part of his testimony, but the version in the article is considerably stronger in its wording, and without having read the testimony, there is no way to verify that the article is accurate. Also "even if the parameters of the simulation were rigged to make that outcome as unlikely as possible." sounds biased and/or ORish to me. Restoring the link to the testimony, and rewording slightly. Thanks for clearing this up. Tengfred 14:19, 10 July 2007 (UTC)

I do. It's plenty of support and the article was accurate before you changed it. Odd nature 16:40, 10 July 2007 (UTC)

I undid the change - you changed the meaning in a way that contradicts the source. Guettarda 17:45, 10 July 2007 (UTC)

The correct source is probably the transcript of Behe's cross-examination, rather than the judge's decision. As the discussion of the Snoke paper covers several pages, somebody will need to identify which answers contain the specific admissions that the statement is talking about. Hrafn42 14:52, 9 July 2007 (UTC)

The statement is accurate since Behe said that in his testimony, which the judge then referenced in his ruling. Odd nature 16:40, 9 July 2007 (UTC)

Category:Roman Catholic activists

I'm not sure that I agree with Behe's (re-)inclusion in this category. He is an (ID-)activist who happens to be a Roman Catholic, but I don't think that you can claim, even at a stretch, that he is an activist for any viewpoint of, or movement within, Roman Catholicism. I would therefore suggest re-removal of this category. Hrafn42 03:53, 20 July 2007 (UTC)

Instead of engaging in a slow-motion edit-war on this subject, could people try discussing this issue here please? Have we any evidence that this category is meant to include anybody who happens to be both (1) a Catholic & (2) an advocate for anything at all, as opposed to my above definition of "an activist for any viewpoint of, or movement within, Roman Catholicism? The former definition would appear to be very broad, and likely to yield an unwieldy & heterogeneous category. Hrafn42 06:34, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

People are still reflexively reverting on this issue. Please discuss! (And yes, after 10 days of unsuccessfully seeking discussion, I have myself reverted on this issue - at least in part in an attempt, in the edit summary, to get people to acknowledge this discussion.) Hrafn42 10:01, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

Didn't know there was a discussion. As FeloniousMonk eloquently puts it, he's Catholic and he's an activist, therefore, he's a Catholic activist. What else to say? OrangeMarlin ^{Talk• Contributions} 14:18, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

Orangemarlin: the trouble is that by that logic, the majority of activists in Spain, Portugal, France, Italy, Poland, South America (and any other Catholic-majority country or region) are "Catholic Activists". This creates a category that is so overly broad as to be essentially meaningless, and one that violates WP:OC, in that it is a "trivial intersection" (between being an activist and being a Catholic). For it to be a meaningful category, the activism needs to be directly related to the Catholicism. Hrafn42 15:18, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

You do realize if you weren't one of the good guys, I'd probably think you're nuts But valid points. Not being Catholic, I wouldn't know--all Christians sound exactly alike to me.  :) But FM may not agree. OrangeMarlin ^{Talk• Contributions} 16:01, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

I find it interesting

I find it interesting that every rebuttle of Dr. Behe's theory's is given at least a paragraph of exposition. In comparison, when Dr. Behe has issued a document, essay, or comment, contradicting those who oppose his theory, all that is mentioned is that he has refuted the claims with no information as to how. It seems only fair that his rubuttles should be included in a non-biased discussion or is that not what we want? After reading several of his essays I can see why a pro Darwinian editor would not want his review of the "acid test" cases include. He refutes them very well.12.10.219.36 18:07, 25 July 2007 (UTC)Bearstar2012

The reason Behe's 'rebuttals' aren't given equal time is WP:UNDUE & WP:NPOVFAQ#Pseudoscience. You may find these rebuttals compelling, but I have yet to find an expert in Evolutionary biology, Immunology, etc who agrees with you. They generally find Behe's understanding of their fields to be defective, as they do the claims he makes about their fields. Hrafn42 18:26, 25 July 2007 (UTC)

Dr. Behe has a PhD in Biochemistry and has done extensive research with DNA. Of course men of differing opinions in fields that his theory would eliminate are not going to run forward and validate their extinction. Prejudice runs deep in all fields where beliefs are strongly held. Your above argument is simplistic. It is like saying that I cannot find a Democratic candidate who agrees with a Republican candidate. That does not mean that either or both are all right or all wrong. To insinuate that Dr. Behe is extropolating random theories, based on prejudice, is inequitable. He seems far more open minded then the dogmatic evolutionist. I am not an expert in the field. I do not have a degree in BioChemistry or Evolutionary Biology (though I can see that the two fields have differing methodologies an agendas)nor have I done extensive research in the fields (I do not know what your experience is.) I do know that I am willing to look at all arguments. I think the fact that no natural observations have destroyed Dr. Behe's arguments and those that appear to are artifically or intelligently altered is very compelling. Many scientic theories in natural science have been ridiculed (such as geologic catastrophism such as super floods and mega volcanos,) but have eventually be proven right. There is no conclusive answer to all these issues and so I think an open mind is the correct, "scientific" course to take.12.10.219.36 20:00, 25 July 2007 (UTC)Bearstar2012

The scientific method is both a philosophical and standardized methodology to test a theory or hypothesis. Where you fail in your arguments is that you think I "believe" in Evolution. It's not a belief, it is a factual understanding of the change of organisms over time. Super floods and mega volcanoes were never ridiculed--they were scientific theories that were debated through scientific analysis, through peer-reviewed journals, and through discussion. As the theories were tested and the hypothesis confirmed, they were fine-tuned. Most, if not all scientists, have no "prejudice" against Dr. Behe, they just don't find his scientific reasoning to be valid. That is based on an analysis of his logic, not based on his Christianity. OrangeMarlin ^{Talk• Contributions} 01:25, 26 July 2007 (UTC)

1. Behe may have a PhD in Biochemistry and has done extensive research with DNA, but none of this research was directly related to Evolution, and little if any of it is recent (he has all but stopped doing scientific research since becoming an ID-advocate).
2. Contra to your assertions, Behe's "theories" would not "eliminate" Immunology.
3. Your comparison to Democrats vs Republicans is a false analogy. Behe's critics are frequently published experts in the fields they criticise him in, Behe has never published his claims in any peer-reviewed journal, nor (to my knowledge) anything at all in the multiple fields within which he is making his claims.
4. Contra to your claims, Behe and his DI comrades are as dogmatic as they come (and delusional to boot), and get considerable funding from religious extremists.
5. We insinuate nothing: the scientific consensus is that Behe's claims are scientifically baseless, and that the ID movement is religiously motivated was proven at Dover.
6. Behe's arguments have repeatedly been demolished, it is just that he pretends otherwise.
7. Scientific theories that have been ridculed then accepted, were accepted because their advocates put in the hard yards with scientific research to substantiate their claims. Behe does not do this, he simply produces a book in the popular press every decade or so, which books are promptly shredded by the scientific community for their basic errors and lack of scientific rigour. Behe's claims have as much chance of eventual acceptance as the hypothesis that the Moon is made of green cheese.

Hrafn42 03:33, 26 July 2007 (UTC)

Category:Signatories of "A Scientific Dissent From Darwinism"

Category:signatory of "A Scientific Dissent From Darwinism" is now Category:Signatories of "A Scientific Dissent From Darwinism". If you attempt to change it back in the article, it will point to a non-existent category. Hrafn42 09:53, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

Claim as a verb

From what I understand in reading WP:WTA#Claim, the word itself carries bias, and a different word should be found. I'm not sure how it being used as a verb would differentiate it, as indicated in this edit summary. Thanks! – Dreadstar † 03:45, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

Dreadstar: could you please explain why WP:WTA should trump WP:UNDUE? Behe's "claims" can quite legitimately be represented as carrying "a very strong connotation of dubiousness", as they have been ubiquitously rejected by the scientific community, and (given that his ID claims are unrelated to any legitimate scientific research he has conducted) he does not deserve to "carry a pretense of authority". Hrafn42 04:01, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

"Claim" is only used as a verb in the usages that are recommended to be avoided in WP:WTA. This creates a question-mark over whether its usage as a noun (as it was in this article) is covered by that style-policy. Hrafn42 04:05, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

My apologies, but I cannot explain how WP:WTA should trump WP:UNDUE, it was certainly never my intention to argue such a thing. I actually find that to be somewhat of a straw man argument, since I do not believe using a different word than "claims" provides any undue weight whatsoever, however, use of that word does seem to go against WP:WTA, which clearly sides with using 'argues' or 'argument' rather than the loaded word 'claims'. I guess I'm not very clear on who is actually doing the 'representing' by the usage of that word, us or the critics? I'm sure you already know what WTA says, but I'll post it here for convenience:

"Editors sometimes create bias, intentionally or unintentionally, by using loaded synonyms for the verb "to say". Standard journalistic words for "to say" are "said," and "stated." Words like "reported", on the other hand, carry a pretense of authority. "Cited" is reserved for when someone cites or quotes another. "Argued" is neutral and useful to paraphrase how someone has promoted a view or idea."

Undue weight in this particular context of the word 'claims", seems to require a more neutral wording since it appeared to be describing Behe's view and not those of his critics. But then, I only did cursory read of the article, so I may be mistaken.

As far as it being only a problem when used as verb, yes I see the indication of that in WTA, but the lines are not as clearly drawn in that regard as I believe is being made the case here. However, I will certainly bow to the consensus and withdraw my proposed change! I was initially drawn to this article while fighting vandals; it's good to see it has so many excellent defenders. And, thanks for clarifying things for me! – Dreadstar † 06:22, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

Reviews of The Edge of Evolution

Given that the The Edge of Evolution is not discussed in this article, merely listed in the 'Books' section, may I suggest that external links to reviews of it should be moved to this book's own article? Hrafn42 13:23, 25 August 2007 (UTC)

How is this name pronounced?

Would someone please write Behe's name phonetically? Max86.141.54.49 16:52, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

Sure. Behe = "kwak" —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.187.190.208 (talk) 03:00, 20 October 2007 (UTC)

This is distasteful, and actually quite a good representation of the overall feel of both the article and the discussion page. This article is far from neutral, and neutrality MUST be reached. I would really like an editor to carefully examine the article, so that it retains neutrality like it is supposed to. The article does contain weasel words, and this article does contain a bias-toward the 'scientific community' (so called). If ID is pseudoscience (due to lake of verifiability) then Darwinism/Evolution is also. The deadlock regarding this article is extremely unprofessional, and is not condusive to retaining the neutrality in this article. The editor needs to rectify this major problem immediately.-- 209.77.231.239 (talk) 17:32, 16 November 2007 (UTC)Theodore from California

Well, the "kwak" comment is certainly out of place here. Could you please be more specific about the article's weasel words? Which are you particularly objecting to? Also, you're as entitled to edit the article as any anyone else, so if you feel that it can be improved, please just go ahead and edit it. Regarding your specific complaint about bias towards the scientific community, well, Behe is a scientist, so the scientific community's view of his ideas is extremely pertinent. Or, at least, it would be were he to publish these ideas in a peer-reviewed journal (the bread and butter of scientific research). Anyway, have a go at editing if you think you can improve things. Cheers, ---- Plumbago (talk) 17:41, 16 November 2007 (UTC)

I think before complaining about "bias-toward the 'scientific community'", the editor should read WP:UNDUE. Behe's claims have no substantial following in the scientific community, are well outside his field of expertise (both in training and in published research), and have been thoroughly shredded by the genuine experts in relevant fields. Any article that did not reflect this massive preponderance of expert opinion would be biased. Hrafn^Talk_Stalk 02:45, 17 November 2007 (UTC)

Category:Pseudoscientists

Since DarthSidious seems intent on making an issue of this, I think it's better to deal with it here, rather than on user-talk:

Please stop adding "Category:Pseudoscientist" to the page for Michael Behe. He is a qualified scientist, who has done a lot of work outside of Intelligent Design advocacy. You're only stating that discrimination should be upheld against ID supporters, regardless of their scientific merit.

DarthSidious 04:05, 27 October 2007 (UTC)DarthSidious

"Scientist" and "pseudoscientist" aren't mutually exclusive. Behe has been largely inactive as a scientist since taking up advocacy of the pseudoscience of ID. He has not "done a lot of work outside of Intelligent Design advocacy" in well over a decade. Please stop making illogical and unreasonable fatwas. Hrafn^Talk_Stalk 04:22, 27 October 2007 (UTC)

It would be nice if someone else could comment on this. He is already a part of the category of "intelligent design advocates." If someone with your extremist views thought that ID proponents were "psuedoscientists," that category would tell them that he is one. But for the less biased people on WP, it's blantat POV pushing.

DarthSidious 07:49, 27 October 2007 (UTC)DarthSidious

Thank you DarthSidious -- zero evidence or reasoned discourse, just a string of personal attacks. You have presented no evidence to support your contention that Behe is not a pseudoscientist. Hrafn^Talk_Stalk 09:27, 27 October 2007 (UTC)

That ID is pseudoscience isn't an extreme view ... it's the consensus of the scientific community.Kww 13:29, 27 October 2007 (UTC)

You accuse me of making "personal atacks," but I would hardly classify what I said as a personal attack. But what you're proposing is unquestingly a personal attack! You claim that opposing atheism stops someone being a scientist, but this is not the case. Behe has done much for biochemistry.

Why are you so passionate about attacking someone's Wikipedia entry? Find something more important to be concerned about.

DarthSidious 09:52, 28 October 2007 (UTC)DarthSidious

Your personal attacks:

• "extremist"
• "biased"
• "blantat POV pushing"

I did not claim "that opposing atheism stops someone being a scientist" -- please stop putting words into my mouth -- it is very dishonest. I would also point out that what Behe is opposing theistic evolution (advocated by many Christians who are scientists) as well naturalistic evolution.

What has "stopped Behe being a scientist" is that he has stopped doing legitimate science. He has not published any scientific research of any significance since becoming an ID advocate. All that he has done is write books like Darwin's Black Box and The Edge of Evolution, and promote ideas such as Irreducible complexity -- all of which is pure pseudoscience. Hrafn^Talk_Stalk 10:39, 28 October 2007 (UTC)

Behe has gained fame by throwing his credence as a minor scientist behind the pseudoscience of religious creation science, renamed intelligent design. He has not used intelligent design in the little scientific work he's done in the last decade, and it's very questionable if he's notable at all as a scientist. However, he's clearly notable as a pseudoscientist. While he may think he's opposing atheism, he's actually supporting empirical theology in opposition to the position held by the Pope and the Archbishop of Canterbury, that their religious beliefs are not subject to empirical testing. If anything, ID lends credence to an atheist argument. ... dave souza, talk 14:29, 28 October 2007 (UTC)

Dave, Kww, and Hrafn are all correct. He pushes ID, which is creationism repackaged. (And, as others have noted, he's not notable for having done anything else) It's pseudoscience, and that makes him a pseudoscientist. Raul654 13:53, 30 October 2007 (UTC)

They are all wrong - the majority of creationists and ID supporters do not have that category attached to them. And he is already part of the category of "Intelligent Design Advocates," which is part of "creationists," which is part of "Pseudoscientists." So even granting your reasoning was correct, you've called him a "Psuedoscientist" twice. That's overkill.

And he notable as being a Professor of Biochemistry.

Also - you have no idea about how to write convincing articles. You should not tell your intended audience that you are pushing propaganda. Instead - you need to make them thing you are presenting things neutrally. Otherwise, they become much more critical of what they read.

DarthSidious 03:51, 5 November 2007 (UTC)DarthSidious

As I pointed out on Category talk:Intelligent design advocates (to which you are also posting):

“ A stronger argument can be made for calling those, who represent their advocacy of ID as being a form of "scientific research", "pseudoscientists" -- in that they are not merely advocating a pseudoscience, they are actively involved in forging false scientific credentials for it. The most obvious examples of this would be Michael Behe and William Dembski, but this argument would also apply to the likes of Jonathan Wells and Scott Minnich. ”

Per accusation of double-categorisation: "exceptions should also be considered when the article subject has a relevance to the parent category that is not expressed by the subcategory's definition" (per WP:CLS) -- I think this applies to Behe, per my above argument.

Contrary to your bald assertion, Behe is not "notable as being a Professor of Biochemistry" -- there are many thousands of professors of various fields throughout the world who are insufficiently notable to rate an article. Behe's contribution to the field of Biochemistry prior to becoming an ID advocate was unexceptional, and his contribution since has been negligible -- clearly indicating that he is not notable as a biochemist. Hrafn^Talk_Stalk 04:30, 5 November 2007 (UTC)

Picture

I just noticed this article is lacking in any pictures of him. We should probably dig one up. Raul654 13:54, 30 October 2007 (UTC)

A whip round?

May have to have a whip round, and see if anyone's got a freely licensed image snapped at one of his performances. In the meantime, this seems relevant.... dave souza, talk 11:23, 31 October 2007 (UTC)

ID?

The ID page http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intelligent_design contains this statement with the following reference

Behe himself has since confessed to "sloppy prose", and that his "argument against Darwinism does not add up to a logical proof."

^ Orr, H. Allen. "Devolution", The New Yorker, 2005-05-30. This article draws from the following exchange of letters in which Behe admits to sloppy prose and non-logical proof: Behe, M.; Dembski, Wells, Nelson, Berlinski (2003-03-26). Has Darwin met his match? Letters—An exchange over ID (HTML). Discovery Institute. Retrieved on 2006-11-30.

Should this be in the article? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 158.234.250.71 (talk) 14:39, 28 November 2007 (UTC)

Behe's scientific output

There has been numerous attempts on this talkpage to represent Behe as being (still) a legitimate scientist. I think this graph and this one clearly demonstrate how moribund he has been scientifically since he became active in ID -- only one published paper (presumably the infamous & discredited Behe & Snoke) in the last decade, and only a single first-authored paper in the 6 years before that. We cannot be sure if ID killed Behe's scientific career, or if he took up ID as a result of his scientific juices drying up -- but either way, there is strong evidence linking the two. Hrafn^Talk_Stalk 09:54, 11 December 2007 (UTC)

Debunked his work?

Who has specifically debunked his work? And in what way? We need citations for the 4 different claims in this very strongly worded paragraph. GusChiggins21 (talk) 20:54, 24 December 2007 (UTC)

Far more than four are already listed in Irreducible complexity‎. It is not necessary to repeat them in this article, per WP:NPOVFAQ#Making necessary assumptions. Hrafn^Talk_Stalk 23:45, 24 December 2007 (UTC)

Please see Wikipedia:Verifiability. We need citations for all statements that are challenged. GusChiggins21 (talk) 05:10, 25 December 2007 (UTC)

Arguments vs. claims

Arguments is a more neutral word. GusChiggins21 (talk) 05:12, 25 December 2007 (UTC)

Consensus about Behe

My edit, which was reverted, was partially to correct incorrectly sources statements. The opening said that scientific consensus was the Behe was wrong, but the citations were only individuals disagreeing with his work, not a claim of consensus regarding his work. I changed the statements to "some scientists" because they were more closely supported by the citations. And someone reverted my tag, claiming it violated NPOV, which is ridiculous. How the hell can a tag violate NPOV?GusChiggins21 (talk) 05:14, 25 December 2007 (UTC)

I just looked over the actual wording again, and it's ridiculous. Behe's ideas about intelligent design are discredited? By a consensus? The only consensus cited is about ID in general, it has nothing to do with Behe's ideas about design. Read what you guys are defending.GusChiggins21 (talk) 09:16, 25 December 2007 (UTC)

Rejection of ID in general necessarily subsumes rejection of Behe's arguments in favour of ID in particular. Additionally, Irreducible complexity cites numerous specific critiques of Behe's work. Hrafn^Talk_Stalk 09:35, 25 December 2007 (UTC)

Well, what the hell are we fighting about? Let's put those specific critiques in here. What you are proposing is original research; we have to extrapolate that because scientists disagree with ID they disagree with Behe. And the wording right now is simply wrong; "Behe's ideas about ID" makes it sound like it's a controversy within ID. GusChiggins21 (talk) 09:43, 25 December 2007 (UTC)

We are fighting about:

1. Your disreuptive editing.
2. Your inability to comprehend WP:NPOVFAQ#Making necessary assumptions, in spite of it repeatedly being drawn to your attention. We do not need to clutter this article by "put[ting] those specific critiques in here."

Hrafn^Talk_Stalk 10:00, 25 December 2007 (UTC)

I asked you where you think I'm being disruptive, and you deleted the comment on your talk page. People are not disruptive because they disagree with you, or because they don't support the wording of an article.

Where are you being disruptive? On pretty much every Creationism/Evolution-related article/talkpage you've edited on, as well as the talkpages of numerous editors. Hrafn^Talk_Stalk 10:43, 25 December 2007 (UTC)

Challenging biased material, and asking for sources is not disruptive. Can you please be more specific? GusChiggins21 (talk) 11:03, 25 December 2007 (UTC)

And, let me get this clear, general statements about ID are preferable to specific statements about Behe on Behe's article? And criticism of Behe is "clutter"?GusChiggins21 (talk) 10:36, 25 December 2007 (UTC)

Specific criticisms of Irreducible complexity that have already been cited in Irreducible complexity are "clutter" in a general article about Behe? Yes, most certainly they are. Hrafn^Talk_Stalk 10:47, 25 December 2007 (UTC)

Also, we still have not dealt with the unsourced claim to consensus that Behe's views are, by consensus of the scientific community, rejected. You even reverted the challenge. GusChiggins21 (talk) 11:05, 25 December 2007 (UTC)

Sorry, where are you getting this from? The only time the word "consensus" appears in the article is with regards to Behe's acceptance of the age of the earth. With respect to the last change you made, Behe's ideas have been rejected by the scientific community (and his own department at Lehigh). Changing that to "many" is incorrect - it implies that some have not. In the decade since DBB, no one (not even his fellow IDists) have tried to test any of his ideas. No one has used Behe's ideas as a springboard for research, mostly because they're useless. Even Behe himself has made no attempt to test his own hypotheses. Despite what he wrote in DBB about the need to create a research agenda (or look foolish), Behe has done nothing of the sort. In short, from the perspective of working scientists, Behe's ideas have been utterly rejected. His latest book has also been found to be riddled with inaccuracies and errors. Saying "many" of his ideas have been rejected would suggest that some weren't. Which would those be? Guettarda (talk) 15:31, 25 December 2007 (UTC)

The standard is not truth, but Wikipedia:Verifiability. I agree that, if you went out and polled most scientists, they would disagree with Behe. However, it doesn't seem to me that we have a citation for the claim of consensus, which addresses this point very specifically: "Claims of consensus must be sourced. The claim that all or most scientists, scholars, or ministers hold a certain view requires a reliable source. Without it, opinions should be identified as those of particular, named sources" Wikipedia:Reliable sources. So, we need a source that states explicitly that 1. scientific consensus is 2. that Behe's ideas are discredited. The sources we have only confirm 2. GusChiggins21 (talk) 20:05, 25 December 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, attacking Guettarda is always a smart move. Good luck Creationist dude. OrangeMarlin ^{Talk• Contributions} 20:29, 25 December 2007 (UTC)

"[I]t doesn't seem to me that we have a citation for the claim of consensus". What claim of consensus would that be? As I said, there is no claim of consensus. Guettarda (talk) 03:34, 26 December 2007 (UTC)

Vandalism?

Challenging a claim to consensus is not vandalism, Orangemarlin. GusChiggins21 (talk) 09:49, 25 December 2007 (UTC)

Apparently, you are misunderstanding the whole area of consensus. Here's the key point:

In fact WP's standard way of operating is a rather good illustration of what it does mean:

1. a mixture across the community of those who are largely agreed,
2. some who disagree but 'agree to disagree' without disaffection,
3. those who don't agree but give low priority to the given issue,
4. those who disagree strongly but concede that there is a community view and respect it on that level,
5. some vocal and unreconciled folk, some who operate 'outside the law'.

You find out whether you have consensus, if not unanimity, when you try to build on it

.

I count the edit as #5, and therefore it is vandalism. Of course, I'm beginning to think of you as a vandal given your tendentious and disruptive editing. If you want a Creationist POV on this article, I can suggest Conservapedia or Creationwiki. This article is neutral, and despite your efforts of working "outside the law", it will remain NPOV. You'll be blocked soon for 3RR, so I'm not too worried. OrangeMarlin ^{Talk• Contributions} 20:34, 25 December 2007 (UTC)

Oooops. Chiggins blocked for a week. Not to gloat, but this was ridiculous. OrangeMarlin ^{Talk• Contributions} 20:39, 25 December 2007 (UTC)

Neutrality Challenge

I challenge the neutrality of this article. It is primarily one long attack on Behe's views. I also deleted the quote from Richard Dawkins, in which Dawkins made a personal and unscientific attack on Behe, referring to him as "too thick".

MindBodySoul (talk) 22:58, 1 January 2008 (UTC)

The article is fairly neutral. If leading scientists refer to Behe as "thick" in publication, you can only imagine the things they say in private. No reliable sources say anything positive about Behe. The fact that the article is non-insulting and doesn't resort to slurs is a testament to it's neutrality. Kww (talk) 23:08, 1 January 2008 (UTC)

Actually, the quote in question doesn't directly call Behe "thick" -- it simply alludes to how Darwin might have described those subscribing to Behe's viewpoint. It is rather blunt but is fairly indicative of the very low opinion that many experts in the fields on which Behe pontificates have of his wilful ignorance of these fields and the spurious logic upon which he builds his creationist fantasies based on this ignorance. Hrafn^Talk_Stalk 02:13, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

I think we need something more substantial than "I challenge the neutrality..." to tag an article. The editor has made no attempt to add any details - any reason why we should keep the tag? I don't see a "dispute". Guettarda (talk) 20:21, 4 January 2008 (UTC)

You are misrepresenting what MindBodySoul said. A reason was given. Read it again. GusChiggins21 (talk) 09:34, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

I saw the dispute tag a couple of minutes ago and wanted to ask who put it there, who disputes NPOV and why? Is MindBodySould the only one and the arguments presented were written by him on 1st January? Please, write some arguments, we all want the NPOV and I am interested to hear what do you have to say about it. --JTrdi (talk) 03:28, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

Not everyone here wants NPOV. A lot of people seem to want a soapbox to attack ID. See above where I got banned simply for asking for references. GusChiggins21 (talk) 10:43, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

Stating one person's biased opinion violates NPOV. Dawkins is clearly biased against Behe, and furthermore he is not making a statement in his "professional" capacity, rather he is merely making a personal attack. Should we include statements Pat Robertson made about evolution on an article about Darwin? And even furthermore, consensus of scientists does not constitute verifiability. Why don't we include the consensus of clergy on ID pages? If it's a religious viewpoint, as you guys claim, shouldn't the consensus of religious experts be what is cited? Shouldn't we also cite the opinion polls that show that only about 10% of American believe in evolution by natural selection? GusChiggins21 (talk) 09:29, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

Asserting repetitively, that this "biased" is just meaningless hot air. Behe's own department holds a similar view of his work as Dawkins. Behe is a pseudoscientist making purportedly scientific claims, which is why it is the scientific viewpoint that is relevant. If he were making purportedly theological claims, we would cite theologians. If he were making insane demands for the assassination of heads of state or prophecies of natural disasters, we might consider citing Pat Robertson. Hrafn^Talk_Stalk 09:45, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

Your bald assertion that 2 editors, who have given multiple explanations, are in fact not giving any explanation, is ridiculous. Furthmore, the opening paragraph asserts that this is a religious position: "in his ruling that intelligent design is not science but essentially religious in nature". Fine, if ID is religious in nature, there should be absolutely no discussion from scientists whatsoever, and it should be replaced with the consensus of religious experts. Wait, that won't work either. Presenting "consensus" as fact tends to present problems, doesn't it? Maybe that's why all of the ID articles are biased? Maybe, instead of asserting consensus of one group as fact, we should write a neutral article! Maybe then, there wouldn't be constant claims of bias by uninvolved editors, all over this project. Something to think about... GusChiggins21 (talk) 10:03, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

He advocates the idea that some structures are too complex at the biochemical level to be adequately explained as a result of evolutionary mechanisms.

This is clearly a purportedly scientific claim, and clearly scientific, not theological, discussion of it is merited. If he made claims relating to the nature of God, etc, we would seek theological discussion. This whole line of argument is tendentious and in bad faith. Hrafn^Talk_Stalk 11:32, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

How the hell can a talk page comment be tendentious? This article, which you're defending, defeats your argument. It flat out says Behe is making a religious argument. So, if this is a religious issue, why aren't any prominent theologians cited? Maybe because they disagree with your POV? Maybe because most people in the world disagree with your POV, and the POV claimed as fact in this article? Because most people believe that evolution was directed? GusChiggins21 (talk) 11:58, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

Religiously motivated, but purporting to be scientific. Thus discussed by scientists, not theologians. Dismissed, for its lack of genuine scientific argument, as being merely religiously motivated pseudoscience. Hrafn^Talk_Stalk 12:10, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

What you stated above is the view of most scientists. It should be stated as such, in the article. But, that viewpoint is in the extreme minority in the general population, and amongst theologians, whose perspectives also should be in the article. Most people on earth would agree with Behe, that there was a god, or gods, involved in the creation of life. As such, it is the extreme majority viewpoint, and according to wikipedia, minority viewpoints should not be given undue weight, as has happened throughout many of the ID articles. Instead of merely describing ID, including a description of how it is largely rejected by scientists, many articles seem to try to prove the view held by scientists, and completely ignore the views of all other human beings. GusChiggins21 (talk) 12:19, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

Agree. This article is biased, and contains contentious material about a living person. GusChiggins21 (talk) 09:18, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

This is simply a bald assertion, and has as much weight as your "biased ... biased" diatribe above. Hrafn^Talk_Stalk 09:45, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

I explained the reason the article has contentious material about a living person above. Do you not understand the arguments being made, or are you ignoring them and hoping that by claiming that we're not making specific points you can dodge the specific points being made? GusChiggins21 (talk) 10:04, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

No you have not. You have made a number of bald assertions about Dawkins, and a number of unrelated tendentious arguments about whose opinions we should be seeking. Hrafn^Talk_Stalk 11:32, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

Stop citing polices about EDITING so that you can go cry to an admin and try to get me blocked for disagreeing with you on a TALK page. Cut the lawyering. Do you actually care about having an encyclopedia, or do you just want to soapbox about intelligent design here, and ban all user that disagree with you?65.24.116.252 (talk) 11:53, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

I take this as an admission by 65.24.116.252 (who according to Kww may be GusChiggins21) that he is a troll with a martyr complex. I'm sorry to disappoint him, but I'm generally too lazy to report trolls to admins -- I let them do that by themselves, by their actions. Regardless, WP:DNFT would seem to apply. Hrafn^Talk_Stalk 02:11, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

I know nothing of the kind, and said nothing of the kind.Kww (talk) 02:18, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

• Gus, you really need to read and understand WP:FRINGE a little better. Behe's concepts come in the class of ideas that have been rejected, are widely considered to be absurd or pseudoscientific . Behe does not publish his books as religious tracts, he holds them up as science. As a result, he has earned the derision of his betters, and we have sampled it here. It would be a trivial effort to fill the article with derisive and insulting statements from reliable sources. Instead, the article goes easy on him, and contains only one quote from Dawkins as representative of the ridicule heaped upon this man.Kww (talk) 15:43, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

I understand fringe, and I am fine with ID being presented as discredited by the majority of scientists. The problem with your argument is that, if you're talking about almost any group besides scientists, evolution by natural selection becomes the fringe theory. Only about 10% of Americans support evolution by natural selection, and I know the numbers are similar in many places in the Muslim world. Currently we are giving the minority opinion far too much weight, even if it is an expert opinion. Would it be fair in political articles to only cite examples of political theorists? Even when there is consensus among political experts? Now, clearly evolution by natural selection isn't as fringe as most fringe theories, because most of it's supporters are experts in the field. But it is most assuredly the minority opinion, and it is definitely being given undue weight when it's almost the only POV cited in article about theories that oppose it. GusChiggins21 (talk) 21:19, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

This is an encyclopedia. Most people don't understand a lot of things, and their opinion isn't given any weight in an encyclopedia article. The evolution articles mention that there are religious objections to evolution. In this case, if you want to add material that indicates how Behe is viewed by religious objectors to science, feel free, so long as you label the material appropriately.Kww (talk) 21:31, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

I think you may be mistaking misunderstanding with disagreement; this is a common error of supporters of evolution by natural selection. For example, because I disagree with how the ID article are written, it's assumed that I'm an ignorant creationist, which isn't the case.

I'd like to add some material about popular support, but whenever I make an edit, it gets reverted with the claim that I "didn't get consensus" (including when I do things that couldn't possibly be construed as "harmful", such as adding links to statements with fact tags). What do other users think? Is it fair to leave the statements about how scientists are very hostile to ID, but that creationism/theistic evolution enjoys popular support, and support from religious experts? It would probably reflect a more worldwide view of the subject as well. GusChiggins21 (talk) 21:40, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

First, this is an article about Michael Behe, not ID. If you add cited material that show that he gets popular support, that would not be revertable on sight, so long as you are careful to not indicated that such popular support has any bearing on the validity of his writings. It is true that he is popular among the uneducated, so documented statements that allude to that are reasonable. What isn't OK, and likely to get you into trouble again, is trying to derive from that support any credence for his ideas.Kww (talk) 22:09, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

If this is an article about Behe, not ID, then why is it full of criticisms of ID? Why does the whole ID project seem to repeat the statement, correct as it is, that scientists consider ID discredited, without any context from other relevant viewpoints in the debate? And define "credence"? As far as I know, Behe is a theistic evolutionist; which is the majority viewpoint. Maybe I'm wrong about that, but even if he's a young earther, scientists aren't the only people that have relevant views in the culture wars. GusChiggins21 (talk)

It deals specifically with Behe's contribution: the concept of irreducible complexity, and his writings that attempt to shore that concept up. It deals with the books that Behe has written, and the criticism that they receive. This is equivalent in concept to, say, Stephen Jay Gould, which outlines each of his major written works and his important theories.

If Behe was simply a theistic evolutionist, he would not encounter the derision that he does. He encounters that derision because he proposes a specific theory that supports his religious beliefs, and fails to grasp that that theory is absurd. As to the culture wars comment, like I said, if you add material showing his reception in the public, that's fine, so long as you don't try to make it seem that Ann Coulter's opinion of Behe has any impact on his lack of scientific accomplishment.Kww (talk) 23:12, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

That sounds fair. Behe is considered discredited by most scientists, but his ideas have a following in the popular culture. GusChiggins21 (talk) 23:19, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

(This one is long, so I'll move to the left) I understand your point and I agree that the article could have something about that following mentioned. However, we should realize that the following should be well sourced and, well, substantial. If I say I found a fly, which can sing 23 national anthems, I might get followers, people, who believe. Each and every thing on this planet has pro and contra activists.
Encyclopedia... well, we have to be honest here, encyclopedias have always been more "scientific". A couple of centuries ago science was what theologists preached. Today it's a consensus, that theology is a science only regarding religion topics. Other than that theology does not use scientific methods for proving their claims. That's why you can not equate scientists and "religious experts", as you call them. They are experts for religious questions, of course. But they are not experts for evolution of the eye. People DO realize that.
Now about the public opinion. Public opinion is important of course and certain parts can be used in an encyclopedia. But it can't change the actual content of the "book", article's POV, if I'm more specific. We are talking about 2 different facts here:
1. Scientific consensus regarding evolution.
2. Some people doubt.
Both facts can be encyclopedic, but they are not contradicting each other. You can't attack first fact with the second one, because they are not on the same planet. They are both true. As I said, both facts can be encyclopedic, but the second one only as... some kind of a poll, that demonstrates certain public aspects. For instance if you'd written an article about Evolution, you could include this poll somewhere: [8]
I'm not sure whether my opinion is clear enough... I'll give you two examples to explain it clearer:
1. There's a theory, where 50% of scientists support A and 50% support B. Let's say that A and B can't both be true. It would make sense to make a Wikipedia article, where A and B would be equally represented, right? I agree.
2. There's a theory, where all scientists believe A to be true, but many people disagree. Does Santa Claus exist? Well many kids believe Santa exists and yet their opinion shouldn't "balance" POV to their side. Scientists probably won't even bother with kids, who claim Santa Claus exists. Now there is one case, where scientists would bother with the claim. Imagine that Mr.X claims SC exists and tries to win a Nobel prize with the proof. I can guarantee you that millions of scientists all over the globe would immediately try to disprove it and probably call it pseudoscience.
I'm coming to my point now. The problem is, that Mr. Behe tries to back up his opinion with SCIENTIFIC methods. If he simply just claimed that he believes in God and that's why he believes in ID, nobody would've cared about it. But once he says, his claims are scientific, he automatically presents them to scientific tests. Now if there is a consensus amongst scientists, that his work is pseudoscience, it is pseudoscience, it can't be any other way. Majority of Americans (and a very small minitority of Japanese, Europeans,...) who believe in Creationism (or ID), do not present is a science, it's simply their faith. They do not pretend to be scientists and their faith is not pseudoscience. Mr. Behe tried to prove it with completely (and I mean completely) scientific methods and failed miserably. It's the same as if I wanted to win a 100m sprint at Olympic Games by having the best haircut. If I went to Beijing this year, I'd have to run my ass off on the stadium. Mr. Behe entered the world of science with his claims and he has to play by the scientific rules. If he doesn't play by scientific rules, his work is pseudoscience AT BEST. That's right, it's actually the most NPOV to call his work pseudoscience, it could be called much worse.
My two cents and I apologize for grammar mistakes, I have English listed as Level 3 on my Userpage and the assessment is probably too generous. ;)... --JTrdi (talk) 01:39, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

The problem with this approach is that it amounts to viewpoint discrimination, and is a circular argument. It's arguing that if a view does not agree with the views of scientists, it is therefore unscientific. Well, then how can the views of scientists ever change? If we call any view that is at all at odds with scientific consensus "pseudoscience",and dismiss it out of hand, then scientific consensus is incapable of changing, and unresponsive to new evidence; in short, it is a faith-based opinion. ID is not science because its not supported by scientists, and it's not supported by scientists because it isn't scientific.

I would propose, instead, that we list arguments that scientists make: ID is unprovable, it's a religious ideology, it's not falsifiable, it's not supported by evidence, etc. And also list the arguments that ID proponents make, i.e. that is IS in fact falsifiable, that evolution by natural selection is not falsifiable, irreducible complexity, teleology, etc. and list the levels of support for all of the various views. GusChiggins21 (talk) 05:55, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

I would propose that GusChiggins21 read WP:UNDUE before making a proposal that blatantly violates it. Hrafn^Talk_Stalk 06:19, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

I suggest that you read the above discussion before you butt in with points that have already been addressed. Evolution by natural selection is the minority viewpoint, and as a result, there is no way to possibly construe that any theory that disagrees with it should not at all be mentioned, which is what you and the protectors of the biased ID articles propose. You need to understand the policy you cited; because you're defending the dominance of a minority viewpoint in an article. GusChiggins21 (talk) 06:37, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

These claims are wholly spurious and without merit. Hrafn^Talk_Stalk 07:55, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

No resort to logic, no argument of any kind? Just giving up and insisting that you're right because you say so? And you're saying my argument is without merit? Flawless logic, sir. GusChiggins21 (talk) 08:41, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

Resorting to either would seem to be futile, given your Pythonesque gainsaying, so I'm not going to waste any further time on you. Hrafn^Talk_Stalk 11:06, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

Then don't waste our time by throwing out accusations that do nothing to build consensus. And I'd prefer that, if you're not going to waste any more time discussing this article, you also don't waste any more time editing it. Thank you. GusChiggins21 (talk) 00:57, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

GusChiggins21, sorry, you clearly don't understand policy, particularly with respect to NPOV: Pseudoscience, NPOV: Undue weight, NPOV: Making necessary assumptions and NPOV: Giving "equal validity". Wikipedia doesn't give weight to opinion polls of the uninformed, it gives weight to majority opinion of experts in the subject. Theologians, philosophers, historians and scientists have all reached the same conclusions about Behe's "ideas", that they're a minor variation on an old theological argument, repackaged as science with the aim of giving religion equal billing with science in US public education, which has been found to be against the First Amendment to the US constitution in a string of court cases. If Behe presents his work as theology, he's in a minority but nonetheless a valid position, an empiricist of the early 19th century. Unfortunately he lays claim to science, and that's where the above provisions come in. Read them carefully, and make specific proposals for improving the article rather than general complaints. .. dave souza, talk 08:07, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

This is untrue. Very few theologians assert evolution by natural selection. I know the catholic church and most mainline protestant denominations in America tend to support theistic evolution. And most conservative denominations support special creation of some kind. I don't know about other places, but in America and the Muslim world, evolution by natural selection is an extreme minority opinion. Since it is the opinion of scientists, it belongs in an encyclopedia, but it should not dominate. You might even be correct in asserting that it should be given somewhat more weight, but clearly it is not the only opinion on the subject, and should not be treated as such. This is an encyclopedia, not a defense of scientific consensus. GusChiggins21 (talk) 08:38, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

Gus, theistic evolution is a name for the position that there is no contradiction between evolution by natural selection and religion. To cite the Archbishop of Canterbury, you seem to have a problem of "a kind of category mistake". ... dave souza, talk 14:30, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

There are, of course, varying positions within theistic evolution. There may be a few that believe in the "watchmaker" version, whereby god created life foreknowing that it would evolve by natural selection into more advanced forms, but I don't think this is very popular at all. But I think almost all that support theistic evolution believe that it was guided by god, not that it occurred by natural selection. It's evolution, but it's not evolution by natural selection, which, according to the definition used by most scientists, would make it a creationist argument. GusChiggins21 (talk) 00:55, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

IMO this is the problem, Gus. Once you will see all errors in your last paragraph, things will so much better for everyone, including Wikipedia. Because it's obvious you can discuss, exchange opinions etc. We all want the article to be as good as possible, so let's try a bit harder to clear the misunderstandings, ok?

1. First of all, this might be en.wikipedia, but American POV is not Wikipedia POV. You probably mention American public opinion so often, because you know it best, I just want this to be mentioned. You also probably realize that evolution by natural selection is a clear majority belief in Europe, for instance.
2. Polls in USA are a bit strange, I have to say. Many of them suggest, that more than 50% people believe in Creationism AND more than 50% of people believe in Evolution. This suggests, that questions might be asked in many different ways and it also suggests that people don't know, what the questions are asking (=they don't know the difference between Creationism and Evolution). This is a very good example of why polls can't be a measure of POV balancing in an encyclopedia.
3. And now the subject where I think we just have a huge misunderstanding of our opinions. There is nothing wrong with mentioning other opinions on the subject. Nothing at all. You have said so, we have said so, we agree about that one. However, these opinions are not scientific opinions and as such they can't contradict scientific facts. If you write it in the way, that it doesn't challenge numerous scientific disprovals of Behe's work, than it can be ok. On the other hand, if you have a source of scientific support of Behe's claims, this would be a major contribution to the article.
But enough talking! Why don't you write here at the talk page exactly what you had in mind, the exact content you suggest putting in the article, as kww suggested. Let's do something instead of just repeating same stuff all over again.--JTrdi (talk) 14:52, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

Stop Leaping on Gus For a Minute

I had a civil discussion with him buried in that stuff above. If he wants to add a few paragraphs describing how Behe is viewed by the ID community, evangelicals, and political commentators, fine. That's valid, doesn't violate undue weight, and is a perfectly legitimate addition to the article, as long as he doesn't cross the line of saying that that endorsement validates Behe's work. He seemed to grasp that concept. Let's see if he can perform.

To Gus: I really suggest that you place your suggested addition on the talk page, or, if you prefer, on my talk page. It's pretty obvious that your actions the day you got blocked left a pretty bad taste in a lot of peoples mouths, and if you put it directly in the article without discussion it may lead to some unpleasantness.Kww (talk) 12:46, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

Sounds good. A note of caution – there are evangelicals opposed to creationism, who have no problem with evolution. .. dave souza, talk 14:33, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

I think I remember one or two evangelicals being prominent in Kansas Citizens for Science. Also I seem to remember one writing a negative review on one of the recent ID books -- might even have been of Behe's Edge of Evolution. Hrafn^Talk_Stalk 16:37, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

Keith B. Miller, was one of them. Hrafn^Talk_Stalk 04:04, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

We could definitely include the evangelicals that support theistic evolution somewhere in this project. And if I'm not mistaken, Behe believes in common descent, which would imply evolution. I think Hugh Ross, a prominent old earth creationist, believes in theistic evolution. GusChiggins21 (talk) 00:59, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

Behe seems to believe in evolution to the extent that it cannot, by somebody with any biological background, be denied -- but insists on crowbarring sufficient spurious 'gaps' of what it 'cannot do' to allow a God of the gaps to be shoehorned in. It seems to be a not particularly coherent, have-cake-and-eat-it, position that is likely to yield derision from both sides. Hrafn^Talk_Stalk 02:41, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

Added a bit to the opening

Thoughts? I think this really helps to change the tone of the article, making it feel a little less like an attack on Behe. It also still allows us to state that scientific consensus is against him. GusChiggins21 (talk) 07:54, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

Gives undue weight to creationism, so I've reverted it. Have a look at level of support for evolution, and you'll find that anti-evolution isn't as popular as you seem to think. Please try to make proposals on the talk page rather than just putting them in the article. .. dave souza, talk 08:09, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

It is also misleading. Leaders of the ID movement have explicitly rejected and denounced theistic evolution on a number of occasions, and Behe's most recently expressed beliefs have exhibited insufficient movement to bring him into the theistic evolution fold. Hrafn^Talk_Stalk 08:20, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

I did discuss it, extensively on the talk page. Hrafn, you refused to discuss it. I said that in the popular culture, theistic evolution and creationism enjoy popular support. And I cited a source that showed they enjoy around 90% support. Including a view that enjoys 90% support is not undue weight. I mean, seriously, think about what you're saying. You are both being disruptive and tendentious, by refusing to discuss on the talk page, and removing well sourced material against consensus. GusChiggins21 (talk) 08:24, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

Again: "It is also misleading. Leaders of the ID movement have explicitly rejected and denounced theistic evolution on a number of occasions, and Behe's most recently expressed beliefs have exhibited insufficient movement to bring him into the theistic evolution fold." Therefore, support for TE has no relevance to Behe or ID generally. I gave up on discussing it with you Gus because of your tendentious editing made further discussion pointless. Hrafn^Talk_Stalk 09:04, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

Again, citing policies that don't support what you're saying is dishonest, disruptive, and I've called you out on it multiple times. No one is engaging in tendentious editing: I talked about this on the talk page, and moved ahead with the consensus that you refused to contribute to. I don't even understand how a reasonable person can reach your conclusion: my tendentious editing made discussion pointless? I hadn't even edited anything!

Anyways, back to improving the article, the section you removed said nothing about the beliefs of leaders of the ID movement, so whatever you're quoting is irrelevant. FACT: 90% of Americans don't support evolution by natural selection, and the numbers are probably similar in the Muslim world. And you're rationale for reverting was that a mention of an opinion held by 90% of the population, in a section that mentions the belief held by 10% of the population, is undue weight? Think about what you're saying. GusChiggins21 (talk) 09:28, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

Fact: the majority of these 90% you keep irrelevantly citing do not support Behe's position of "common descent, but a few gaps for God" either. Fact: "Your citations back some of the facts you are adding, but do not explicitly support your interpretation or the inferences you draw." -- which is straight out of WP:TEND. Hrafn^Talk_Stalk 09:35, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

Oh yeah, and tendentious editing isn't even a policy, so quit citing it like it is. Back, again, to the article: If you read carefully, I didn't say that the majority support Behe's position. I said the majority believe in either special creation or theistic evolution, which is true, about 90% believe this. GusChiggins21 (talk) 09:42, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

I never stated that WP:TEND was a policy (funny that you should feel the need to rebut I point I didn't make). It is however a very good summary of why I, and a number of other editors, have an extremely low opinion of you, and your contributions here. No, you did not say that they support him, but you did insert this irrelevance in at a point that it would clearly tend to create the inference that they did. This is very dishonest, as well as being exactly what the section from WP:TEND I quoted to you above was talking about. Hrafn^Talk_Stalk 09:58, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

What in the world are you saying? Is your argument now that what I wrote shouldn't be included because it might cause someone reading it to believe that everyone supports Behe? If that's the case, you need to be more specific, and help us re-phrase it. Otherwise, while, they may not support some of his specific positions, on the subject of whether there was divine involvement in the origins of life, YES, almost everyone does agree with Behe on that point. Is it dishonest to state things that are true and verifiable? Isn't that exactly what wikipedia is supposed to do?GusChiggins21 (talk) 10:24, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

The bare issue of "divine involvement" is only a very tiny part of Behe's thesis. Popular agreement with this point is therefore largely irrelevant. I was arguing that it shouldn't be included because it is irrelevant and serves no purpose other than to mislead. You are again drawing illegitimate and tendentious inferences, so I see no point in further discussion on this topic. Hrafn^Talk_Stalk 10:44, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

You know, the whole point of wikipedia is to COLLABORATE. If you're unable to do that, and instead insist on whining and lawyering whenever anyone disagrees with you, I suggest you find somewhere else to "contribute". I put contribute in quotes, because you actually don't contribute anything. Either discuss things and attempt to improve the article, or shut up and quit editing. This is getting ridiculous. 06:06, 9 January 2008 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by GusChiggins21 (talk • contribs)

Thank you for that piece of bogus, self-serving and completely fallacious advice Gus. It is impossible to "collaborate" with somebody who does nothing but spout self-serving, spurious and tendentious illogic. Either make well-reasoned, substantiated comments, or please decamp to Conservapedia, where ideology matters and logic and substantiation don't. Hrafn^Talk_Stalk 06:30, 9 January 2008 (UTC)

You are a troll, you are engaging in personal attacks, you refuse to collaborate with other editors, you display an attitude of ownership of articles, you are dishonest, and you constantly violate wikipedia policy on reversions. As a result, I will no longer respond to any of your talk page statements that do not make any sort of rational or logical appeal. If you want to discuss the article in a constructive way here, I would love to do so, but until you choose to do that, I'll be ignoring you. Thanks. GusChiggins21(talk) 21:37, 9 January 2008 (UTC)

You're acting like a silly boy, Gus. Take the good advice you've been given to improve the article, or leave it alone. ... dave souza, talk 22:15, 9 January 2008 (UTC)

Although the discussion here seems to have finished, I just wanted to add that I support Hrafn's removal here. The text GusChiggins added was unhelpful to the article; it's entirely irrelevant to questions of science what 'the majority of people' think. It was once true that 90% or more of people believed the Sun revolved around the Earth, but that doesn't make that viewpoint any less wrong. Terraxos (talk) 16:00, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

Gus asked me about why he was reverted, and I tried to explain to him. I will repeat that if any editor produces well-sourced statements about Behe's reception among other audiences, that will be a very reasonable addition to the article.

Again to Gus: Behe's theory, as of today, basically amounts to this: All life on this planet, including man, is descended from a single organism, through the evolutionary processes described by mainstream science, except that God intervened to create the bacterial flagellum, three proteins in the blood clotting cascade of humans, and a portion of the mammalian immune system. That isn't a theory that has received wide support in any circle, and general support for ID can't be confused with support for Behe.Kww (talk) 18:07, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

Fair enough. So does a discussion of popular support for creationism/theistic evolution belong in other ID/creation/evolution articles? Which ones? I'm trying to add something that will balance the tone of the articles (which presently very strongly stress the opinion of the scientific community). There's nothing wrong with writing very strongly that the scientific community thinks creationism is retarded, but I think we're giving undue weight if we fail to mention that these ideas have a large following in the general public. GusChiggins21 (talk) 20:10, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

Gus, if you've read through the links I've posted above, you'll have found that it's policy that scientific (or pseudoscientific) claims have to be shown in the context of the scientific consensus and its critical appraisal of the evidence and the arguments. It's a good idea to find a reliable secondary source about the extent of support for the ideas in the general public (inside and outside the US) and for theological commentary on the ideas, but these are likely to be about ID as a whole rather than Behe in particular, and primary sources closely associated with the DI are simply unreliable. My impression is that they make distorted claims, commissioning polls and claiming that everyone who doesn't "believe" in evolution supports them. The "level of dissent" petition shows the pattern – an ambiguous statement that many evolutionary scientists could sign while wholly accepting the modern evolutionary synthesis is presented as support for ID. So, find outside sources and discuss them here, and I'm sure we can work out an addition to the article. .. dave souza, talk 20:27, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

claim vs has said

the use of 'claim' for the expression of one's personal belief or conviction is inappropriate. "The pope claims he believes in God" would be equally inappropriate. If there is evidence of the contrary, though, it would be an appropriate verb, for example "He claims he once fully accepted the scientific theory of evolution, but in a 1985 interview he said that he has always doubted it.". Since there seems not to be any such contrary evidence, the neutral verb 'say' is better. Northfox (talk) 13:12, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

This is supposed to be the norm on wikipedia, but wikipedia policies don't apply on intelligent design pages, for some reason. I already tried to fix the issue, and it was reverted multiple times. On articles about people that hold viewpoints that wikipedians don't like, you can write whatever you want, without properly sourcing it, and if anyone removes it, they will be banned. Just to let you know. GusChiggins21 (talk) 10:38, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

Well, he says one thing and contradicts it elsewhere. So there are two competing "claims", not so? Guettarda (talk) 13:06, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

Yes, they would be. Good call Guettarda. And last I checked, WP rules apply on all pages. Sorry if you don't get your way Gus. Baegis (talk) 20:01, 15 January 2008 (UTC)