Category talk:Denialism

Creationism

Given how broad a spectrum the label 'creationism' covers-- from geocentrism to young Earth creationism to Intelligent Design to theistic evolution-- it makes little sense to have it in the article, let alone to give it such prominence. Since "denialist" is strongly pejorative, "they hate being called 'deniers'" [1], the listing of specific living people should be treated with extreme caution on a case by case basis; there should not be long subcategories of 'deniers'. 'Denier' has been appiled to a wide variety of people-- David Irving, Timothy F. Ball, Bill White, Michael Behe, and Noam Chomsky-- and the burden of proof rests with the arguements for inclusion. Revolutionaryluddite 18:25, 21 August 2007 (UTC)

I don't currently see it in this category. I'm guessing that people putting it in there were thinking of young Earth creationism and/or Intelligent Design. Geocentrism takes it one further, but I don't think most people necessarily associate it with YEC. Ben Hocking ^{(talk|contribs)} 18:30, 21 August 2007 (UTC)

Teach the Controversy is currently on the main category list. Intelligent design is no longer on the main category list, but it is still under the subcategory creationism. Revolutionaryluddite 02:12, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

Shermer mindlessly lumps together widely disparate groups of people who disagree with the statement “Human beings have developed over millions of years from less advanced forms of life, but God had no part in this process”, regardless of their motives, as 'deniers'. I strongly disagree with the statement; as does Rudy Guiliani based on his comments in the Republican debates. Shermer also says "One explanation for these results is that although in general education leads to a decrease in religious faith, for those people who are educated and still believe in God there appears to be a need to justify their beliefs with rational arguments." How is it that only people who's parents can afford $10,000+ annual college tuition can make "rational arguments"? If higher education plays a role in the loss of someone's personal faith, is it through logical thinking or the hostile environment and rigorous peer pressure of other students? Look, creationists argue amongst themselves as much as they argue with the 'brights' Revolutionaryluddite 02:40, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

At the end of the day, regardless of how much fundies bicker among themselves, creationism of all stripes is a denial of the overwhelming evidence for evolution and we have reliable sources that attest to that. ornis (t) 02:43, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

Fundies... (?) Anyway, it just makes no sense to call every single person who tries to mix religion with evolution an 'evolution denier'. Wikipedia cites sources that offer compelling evidence in Darwin's theory of natural selection and common ancestry. But are there specific sources that link creationism in general and intelligent design specifically with 'denialism' beside blogs, Op-Ed columns, et cetera? Revolutionaryluddite 03:00, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

Was 'fundies' supposed to be an insult twoards me? If so, I don't find it insulting. (If not, don't worry about it.) Revolutionaryluddite 03:05, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

Well his book for one. We also have Michael Hopkins from talk.origins ornis (t) 03:29, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

I'm an atheist, and I would not call believers in theistic evolution "fundies". Nor, however, would I call them believers in Intelligent Design. I firmly believe these two categories are orthogonal to each other. Ben Hocking ^{(talk|contribs)} 13:31, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

Again, though, it just makes no sense at all to say that anyone who attempts to mix Darwin's scientific theory with their personal faith is a 'evolution denier'. All creationists are not the same. That would be like lumping together Marxist-Leninists, Stalinists, Maoists, National Bolsheviks, Trotskyites, Christian socialists, and Anarcho-syndicalists and saying "Whatever, they're all just commies bastards."

'Disagreement' does not mean 'denial'. Michael Behe fully accepts common descent and microevolution, but rejects certian forms of macroevolution based on irreducible complexity. Is he a 'denier'? I personally accept Darwinian evolution wholeheartedly with the singular exception of human evolution; it's not that I believe Homo habilis etc did not exist, just that I think there's a big enough gap between them and homo sapiens that something else besides random chance had to have been involved. Is this 'denial'? Take the example of global warming. If someone accepts that the earth is warming, the warming is due to human factors, the warming will continue to dangerous levels if things are not done about it, but at the same time disagrees with the IPCC methodology and conclusions-- does that make them a 'climate denier'? Revolutionaryluddite 16:56, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

My opinion is that the subcategory Creationism should be removed, and individual creationist theories and/or people and/or organizations should be added to the main category on a case by case basis. I have mixed feelings about including Teach the Controversy. Of course, there is no controversy. Attempts by ID-ers to force other scientists to debate them through the legal process smacks of David Irving-style intimidation. Still though, just because the actual ID theories happen to be wrong doesn't necessarily make it 'denial'. Revolutionaryluddite 17:42, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

An addendum (which I should have stated in the first place), I also don't think that believers in theistic evolution are denialists. I think having individual sub-branches of Creationism in this category on a case-by-case basis makes sense, too. As for AGW, I agree that not agreeing with the IPCC doesn't necessarily make you a denialist. Finally, as for your human evolution beliefs, you might be interested in Genesis and the Big Bang — unless it's been fixed in a later edition, the science is a bit dated, but the points it makes are still interesting. (I've also read, and enjoyed, Behe's Black Box book, even though I've never doubted evolution.) Ben Hocking ^{(talk|contribs)} 17:51, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

I personally switched over from ID to TE after reading Kenneth R. Miller's excellent book Finding Darwin's God, reviewing statements by Alfred Russel Wallace- the Darwinist before Darwin- on how his discoveries complimented his theism, and studying the flaws in irreducible complexity. As much as I disagree with the ID-ers, though, I don't think they should be called 'denialists' because it cheapens the orginal meaning of the term: A 'denier' is primarily someone who trivializes the deaths of innocent people-- whether by AIDS denialism, holocaust denial, etc. That said, I'm still not sure about including Teach the Controversy. The methodology and tacticts seem 'denialist'. Revolutionaryluddite 18:18, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

Reading the sources at the Teach the Controversy article and at intelligent design, is clearly denialism and will remain in this category until which time more notable sources say otherwise.

BTW, discussions on article inclusion in this category are supposed take place at the article talk pages, not here. FeloniousMonk 13:38, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

As long as verifiable and reliable sources exist that make the link to creationism and denialism and that the opinion is consistent with the wider views of the academic community about creationist's allegedly scholarly claims, then inclusion in the category is warranted per policy, guideline and the recent arbcomm ruling on categorization of pseudoscience (which is analogous). FeloniousMonk 13:59, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

The term 'Creationism' explicitly includes theistic evolution. Of course, it is logically impossible for me to prove that Intelligent Design is not 'denialist' the same way it is impossible for an atheist to prove that God does not exist. I could quote dozens of sources that describe ID without using the word 'denial' or 'denialist', but that wouldn't matter. If you think that disagreement with more than, say, 75% to 85% of strict non-theistic evolution constitutes 'evolution denial'-- which would make everything across the creation-evolution spectrum up to and including Intelligent Design 'denialist'-- than I personally can go with that. Revolutionaryluddite 20:20, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

Try that again. I'm pretty sure there was a point in there somewhere, but where? What was it? Debates don't work very well if one is trying to dispute an illogical or poorly-stated position. •Jim62sch• 21:18, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

I'm a somewhat slow typist with average spelling and grammar skills. We all have to crawl before we can walk, don't we? Anyway, I had three points to make: (1) Theistic evolution is a subset of creationism. Description of creationism as 'evolution denial' without any additional information implies that Theistic evolution is also 'evolution denial'. (2) I personally think that while most believers in Intelligent Design are 'evolution deniers' in the normal sense of the term, some ID believers aren't. ID-as-an-ideology is an 'edge case' given that it accepts most of strict non-theistic evolution while rejecting what they see as 'gaps'. (3) I'm sure that spending half an hour on Google can produce a dozen or so webpages calling ID 'evolution denial' the same way I could find a dozen of webpages that call ID "flawed" or "misguided" or "wrong" without ever using the term "denialist". Revolutionaryluddite 21:32, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

You're still trying to make your case by arguing whether or not your point is right, correct, or true. But that's not how Wikipedia works. The things that are necessary for a topic to be included here are that it is verifiable, identified as such, by a reliable and notable source; read WP:NPOV, WP:V and WP:RS. You're still wasting your time and ours with all these objections based on your personal experience, your personal beliefs, etc. Sources have been provided, accept it and move along. Odd nature 23:39, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

I could produce dozens of sources that condemn Intelligent Design without calling it "denialism" and instead use words like "flawed", "misguided", "filled with errors", "psuedoscience", and so on. It wouldn't matter, since you insist that a partisan political statement and hyperbolic comparisons by non-scientists should be in the article. How many people have called Al Gore and liberal Democrats 'deniers' for falsely claiming that President Bush did not receive the majority of Florida's votes in 2000? Does that information have to be in those respective articles? This is all irrelevant though, since I'm giving up. And I am moving along. Revolutionaryluddite 01:35, 24 August 2007 (UTC)

Odd nature: Have a single one of those sources claimed that theistic evolution is denialism? Also, isn't WP:WEIGHT relevant to this discussion as well? It seems to me that there is such a small minority of people who might call TE denialism (if there is even a single person), that there would be no reason for someone to say it wasn't. Ben Hocking ^{(talk|contribs)} 01:40, 24 August 2007 (UTC)

Benhocking, I'm guilty of confusing together my two arguements-- (1) That theistic evolution is not 'evolution denial' and (2) that some Intelligent Design advocates are not 'deniers', though most are, while ID-as-an-ideology is more of an 'edge case' that I'm not sure about. Revolutionaryluddite 02:02, 24 August 2007 (UTC)

I think part of the problem is that Intelligent Design itself is (a) a term that is quite vague as to what it means, and/or (b) used incorrectly by many people who are closer to being theistic evolutionists to describe themselves. IMO, atheism suffers from the same problem (cf. agnosticism). Of course, Wikipedia isn't about finding the WP:TRUTH but about finding reliable and verifiable sources. I'm sure one could find references that describe ID in multiple forms. The problems is that, ultimately, putting it into a particular category is a boolean decision. Ben Hocking ^{(talk|contribs)} 02:11, 24 August 2007 (UTC)

Interestingly, the source used in Denialism-- [2]-- to describe ID-ers as 'deniers' does not distinguish between ID and progressive creationism, saying "Alongside these different movements that come together under the heading of strict creationism, we also find so-called progressive creationism, which does not totally reject evolution but argues that creation necessarily involved successive divine interventions." The Wikipedia article states that PC is closely related to TE, but that there are several differences. "Most notably, most progressive creationists would state that God specially created Adam directly as opposed to breathing life into a sub-human primate." Belief a single gap would arguably make one more PC than TE. Anyway, the point that I've been making is that inclusion of both TE-PC-ID, ID but not TE-PC, ID-PC but not TE, or none of them is a 'weight decision'-- how many people have described ___ as 'denialism' compared to ___ and ___-- that is basically arbitrary. I'm sure that I could find sources calling all three 'evolution denial'. Revolutionaryluddite 02:37, 24 August 2007 (UTC)

I've no intention of arguing anything, I just wanted to point that out. Revolutionaryluddite 02:38, 24 August 2007 (UTC)

Genocide Denial

Rather than just linking to genocide denial, why not include special ideologies: Armenian Genocide denial, Bosnian Genocide denial, Japanese war crimes denial, et cetera. 'Deniers' are a motley crue-- an ideological Marxist-Leninist supporter of a greater Serbia definately would not deny the holocaust as well. Revolutionaryluddite 02:21, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

Good catch, feel free to add them to the cat when the deletion debate is closed ( assuming it's closed as keep or no consensus to delete ). ornis (t) 02:25, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

I'm wondering... does it have to be clear 'acts of genocide' for those who deny it to be considered 'deniers'? What about what happened in East Timor after they declared their independence? What about the mass execution of Polish dissidents by the Soviet Union? It's a numbers game; how does denial of the death of hundreds compare to denial of the death of millions? Revolutionaryluddite 02:47, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

Is there substantial evidence that the events took place? Is the overwhelming consensus of those that study those events that they did in fact take place? Are there people that despite this, still maintain that these events never occurred or weren't really genocide?

If the answer to all of these questions is "yes" then we have denialism on our hands. Nothing to do with numbers. ornis (t) 02:52, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

I think a massacre would only be even a candidate for being considered an act of genocide if the primary motivation were ethnic and/or if a significant proportion of an ethnic group was killed (including in related events). I doubt if the Katyn massacre counts. Hrafn42 03:01, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

Granted, but it's still denial of an atrocity in the face of evidence. Now that I consider it, do Pol Pot's purges count as genocide? I believe most people consider them to be, though they didn't target ethnic groups so much as political ones. ornis (t) 04:08, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

Agreed. Eventually, multiple sub-cats of 'atrocity denial' will probably be needed (genocide, war crimes, etc). Hrafn42 04:26, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

Would there be sufficient number of cases with articles to make it worthwhile having a 'genocide denial' subcat? Hrafn42 02:54, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

At the moment, probably not, though it's definitely something to consider for the future. ornis (t) 03:05, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

My point is that someone who denies that nationalist Japan perfomed human experimentation or that the Soviet Union put innocent people in Gulags is not exactly a 'genocide denier'-- should we include 'crimes against humanity deniers'? Revolutionaryluddite 03:03, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

No we just stick them in this top level cat unless there are enough articles about their specific type of denialism to warrant a sub cat. ornis (t) 03:05, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

The category is still here because...

"keep after marginal no consensus bordering on keep"-- I'm not entirely sure what this means. Revolutionaryluddite 16:29, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

I see that the vote was 15/24 verses 9/24 in favor of 'keep', that is 62.5% to 37.5%. It's a clear majority, but it's not a consensus. Revolutionaryluddite 17:56, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

That means there was no clear consensus to delete. Cats and articles are only deleted if the consensus is clearly in favour of deletion. ornis (t) 21:42, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

Right, and the vote was about evenly split. Revolutionaryluddite 23:15, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

Apologies if my closing remarks have confused anyone. I did not see a clear consensus to keep, but it was close to consensus. There certainly was no consensus to delete. Perhaps I should just have gone for "keep" or "no consensus, so keep". Anyway, it is still here and I stand by that conclusion from the discussion. --Bduke 23:32, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

That's called 'no consensus'. Sour grapes? FeloniousMonk 13:40, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

(?) Revolutionaryluddite 20:01, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

FM: I think RL was merely agreeing with you and not arguing with you — hence his confusion. (I'll agree there was some ambiguity in his statement, however. If you assume he's agreeing with you, the statement can be inferred to agree with you. If you assume he's disagreeing with you, the statement can be inferred to disagree with you.) Ben Hocking ^{(talk|contribs)} 20:10, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

If we all agree, then why are we arguing? Revolutionaryluddite 21:34, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

Perhaps because I'm not the only one with these flaws. Ben Hocking ^{(talk|contribs)} 22:11, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

Suggestion

Alright how does this sound to every one. We create two new sub cats: "evolution denial" and "atrocity denial".

• Category:Atrocity denial would cover things like japan's whitewash of IJA atrocities during WWII and the sino-japanese war, denail of the armenian genocide and denial of pol pot's atrocities.

• Category:Evolution denial, would be reserved for overtly anti-science varieties of creationism and their various supporting campaigns, so in this case Revolutionaryluddite 02:04, 23 August 2007 (UTC)Category:Creationism would be removed, and specific articles would be added.

Would this satisfy everyone? ornis (t) 21:40, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

That seems like a good idea, although I think a three subcategory split with 'war crimes denial', 'genocide denial', and 'evolution denial' would be better. Also, the term 'evolution denial' seems overly general-- almost no creationists deny that natural selection occurs, they just dispute that one order could have evolved from another-- and POV worded. What about 'Darwinism denial' or 'macroevolution denial'? Revolutionaryluddite 23:13, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

"'Darwinism denial' or 'macroevolution denial'?" No and double no, they're both creationist strawmen. Evolution denial can be sourced, those can't. Whatever specific aspect of evolution it is they choose to attack, be it speciation, unguided natural selection, or the very existence of a fossil record, it's all aimed at undermining evolution, and only works if you deny the evidence. ornis (t) 00:06, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

I'm not defending their beliefs, I'm just recognizing that ID-ers agree with evolution up to a point. They dispute some parts of the fossil record, but not most of it. They firmly agree the scientific consensus with natural selection, the age of the earth, and the existence of fossilized animals, but they, in general, disagree with common descent for humans. Again, evolution and creationism are not binary opposites like 'night and day' or 'black and white'-- more like liberalism verses conservatism. Anyways, if the subcategory 'evolution denial' will only include those who deny all/most of the theory-- flood geology, young earth creationism, and so on-- than its name makes sense. If the subcategory will include Michael Behe and everything associated with Intelligent Design, then it should be renamed to reflect exactly what it is being 'denied'. In any rate, I think that 'Atrocity Denial' and 'Science Denial' would be a better idea. Revolutionaryluddite 00:26, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

Wikipedia is not about truth it's about verifiability. I think you'll find the false dichotomy is something you've added —I guess that's an artefact of theism— I've never argued that evo-cre is a binary distinction, but that a common element to most forms of creationism, is a denial of one or more aspects of evolution, and the evidence that supports that aspect. YES even ID, in fact ID is practically the poster-child of modern anti-evolution denialism. Behe is still using argument that where debunked ten years ago, he simply ignores the evidence, a fact he admitted to in court. ornis (t) 00:52, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

"Wikipedia is not about truth it's about verifiability." Verifiability is going to extrodinarily difficult given that 'denialism' is a neologism and that use of the term in this case is limited to passionate evolution advocates such as Michael Shermer that apply the term to anyone that disagrees with them. In any rate, denial does not mean disagreement. The 'denier' label applies to those denying historical or scientific truths. Is someone an 'evolution denier' if they agree with most of the theory with the exception but disagree regarding what they see as 'gaps'? Suppose they only believe in one gap: That the chemical building blocks of life-- amino acids, etc-- could have not been created and preserved on their own. That the first eukaryotic cell could not evolved naturally due it its complexity. Or that the sense of self-awareness possessed by homo sapiens is too unique to have come from natural selection. Is that one gap enough? How small does the disagreement with Darwinian evolution have to be before that person is no longer a 'denier'? Revolutionaryluddite 01:14, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

"evolution advocates such as Michael Shermer that apply the term to anyone that disagrees with them"? What rubbish. If that's what you think, then I suggest in all seriousness, that you go back and look at his arguments. He arrives at the term, by drawing legitimate comparisons in their goals and methods. And quite frankly, theists can stick their god in whatever gaps they like, but it only becomes denialism, when they then declare those gaps filled forever more and un-close-able by science. This is what ID does and they use the same methods that holocaust deniers employ, the only reason they're resorting to smaller and smaller gaps, is because in spite of their best efforts, real scientists are closing those gaps. ornis (t) 01:30, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

"drawing legitimate comparisons in their goals and methods": I've previously noted the simiarity between the tacticts and methodology of certian ID-ers with holocaust deniers; though their goals are entirely different. "theists can stick their god in whatever gaps they like, but it only becomes denialism, when they then declare those gaps filled forever more and un-close-able by science": This is true applied to some ID-ers, but it's a strawman when applied to ID as a belief now. You note that "the only reason they're resorting to smaller and smaller gaps, is because in spite of their best efforts, real scientists are closing those gaps": You seem to be implying that many ID-ers are honest, rational people who are persuaded by scientific evidence and have enough of an open mind to abandon their beliefs. Look, I'm not defending ID or the people that believe it. They are wrong. But they are not entirely wrong given that they agree with 'most' of strict non-theistic evolution where theistic evolutionists such as myself would agree with 'nearly all' and young earth creationists would agree with 'some' or 'none'. I still don't understand what you think: How much disagreement must there be before it becomes 'denial'? Yes, Behe's complexity arguements have been debunked, but that is his only major conflict with evolution-- he entirely agrees with common descent and so on. Where do you draw the line? Revolutionaryluddite 02:04, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

To be clear, I'm okay with having a subcategory 'Evolution Denial'; I just don't think that Behe and ID-as-an-ideology should be inside it. Teach the Controversy is far more debatable; it's a tactic and one that correlates with 'denialism' as defined by the main article. Revolutionaryluddite 02:39, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

Category:Evolution denial seems fairly narrow. How about Category:Science denial? That would include articles such as Climate change denial and any article about tobacco and cancer denial as well. Ben Hocking ^{(talk|contribs)} 23:59, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

Having two subcategories 'Atrocity Denial' and 'Science Denial' seems like the best idea. Revolutionaryluddite 00:08, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

No. Science denial is needlessly broad, and in any case there's already a subcat for environmental skepticism. ornis (t) 00:10, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

What about 'Atrocity Denial', 'Darwinian Evolution Denial', and 'Evironmental Science Denial'? Revolutionaryluddite 00:56, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

Ah... no, you seem to have ignored everything that I've said so far... Darwinism and darwinian are just creationist strawmen, caricatures of evolution they set up to knock down for the edification of their true-believers. And there's already a category for climate change denial. Atrocity denial, obviously I have no problem with. ornis (t) 01:01, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

If you prefer the general term 'Evolution Denial' to the precise term 'Darwinian Evolution Denial', that's fine. The point I'm trying to make is that the vast majority of people disagree with strict non-theistic evolution and that a broadly titled subcategory would be less helpful than a specifically titled subcategory that only describes disagreement with all/most of strict non-theistic evolution, which would be 'denial', and does not describe disagreement with some/part of strict non-theistic evolution. I prefer the term 'Darwinian Evolution Denial' because it's more accurate. This is not nitpicking, but it's close. If you think that it should titled 'Evolution Denial', I can go along with that. Revolutionaryluddite 01:38, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

I think you're confusing methodological naturalism with philosophical naturalism. Even an orthodox catholic christian like miller, works on the assumption of m-naturalism, though in his private life he would reject p-naturalism. Conflating the two is a political-creationist tactic, done largely to set up a false choice dilemma, viz Evolution or god. ornis (t) 01:55, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

I know there's a significant differance between them, but we're talking about categories of people. Many ID-ers sincrely believe that they are following m-naturalism even though they are not, and many p-naturalists believe that they are merely applying scientific skepticism to ordinary life. Naturalism (philosophy) states that "observable effects in nature are best explainable only by natural causes" under this belief, but Behe and several other ID-ers sincerely believe that they're abiding by this. Look at his book "Darwin's Black Box". Anyway, like I said, I would fine with a subcategory 'Evolution Denial' so long as it's contents were determined on a case-by-case basis. Revolutionaryluddite 02:26, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

Well (citing Kitzmiller again), behe admitted that in order for ID to be science, science would have to be redefined in such a way as to not require methodological naturalism. ornis (t) 03:13, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

I'd also contend that the term Darwinism is not actually more precise, since that's not what the modern theory is called, and the term has in any case been poisoned by association with eugenics. ornis (t) 02:03, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

I see your point about the term 'Darwinism' having negative connotations due to its associations with Social Darwinism. Bringing that up was not my intent. Revolutionaryluddite 02:26, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

I understand that wasn't your intent, I brought that up as a addendum to my comment about darwinism being a strawman. ornis (t) 03:13, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

The problem is that (various forms of) Creationism is denial of a wide range of science. In its most extreme form, Young Earth Creationism, it involves denial of, among other things, geology (through Flood Geology), nuclear physics (as this underlies geochronology and science's estimate of the age of fossils rocks & the Earth) and astrophysics (age of astronomic bodies & the universe). I would suggest 'Creationist denial of science' as a title more reflective of this diverse disagreement. Hrafn42 02:16, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

Please review Category_talk:Denialism#Creationism. The broad term 'creationist' applies to everything from Young Earth Creationism to theistic evolution and more. ConfuciusOrnis' compromise makes a lot more sense. Revolutionaryluddite 02:30, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

LOL... back to square one eh? Never mind. I'm of the opinion, that while, yes they do attack a great many fields, the key target of those attacks is evolution. ornis (t) 03:13, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

I didn't realize until now that there is a subcategory 'Evironmentalal Skepticism'; I agree it there should be mentioned. Revolutionaryluddite 02:39, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

I've already made it a subcat of this cat. ornis (t) 02:58, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

This seems quite problematic as the denialism article goes to great lengths to distinguish itself from mere skepticism. Ben Hocking ^{(talk|contribs)} 13:07, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

It should probably be reworded to 'Evironmental Science Denial' or something like that. Revolutionaryluddite 21:37, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

Don't see a need or a benefit of this proposal. Is this category over-populated? FeloniousMonk 13:49, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

FM raises an excellent question. Why do we even need subcats at this point? Ben Hocking ^{(talk|contribs)} 13:52, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

The reason I initally wanted to have subcategories is because I thought that there should be a section called 'atrocity denial' or something like that which would include denial of 'acts of genocide' and denial of 'attempted genocide'. A 'no subcategory' policy would be fine with me. I realize that I'm completely alone in believing some kinds of Intelligent Design is not 'denial' like holocaust denial. Revolutionaryluddite 20:07, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

Just to make sure we're clear. When most people say Intelligent Design is 'denial' like holocaust denial is 'denial', they're saying it (I hope) in the sense that an elephant is a mammal like a mouse is a mammal. I.e., it merely means they have certain characteristics in common and not that they are in any way equivalent. Ben Hocking ^{(talk|contribs)} 20:13, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

"If we are not careful, creationism could become a threat to human rights"- a Council of Europe statement referred to by the article Denialism. [3] Personally, I think that things like, say, the prolific use of CCTV Cameras in public places should be considered a violation of human rights. I know I'm sounding very POV here, but I think that the council's near-unanimous claims are almost Orwellian in their logic. Revolutionaryluddite 22:54, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

No disagreement here. I think creationism is damaging to our nation's education system, but I cannot make the jump (in good conscience) to human rights. Ben Hocking ^{(talk|contribs)} 23:02, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

That's a personal opinion. The source is notable and reliable. Unless you've got another source that outweighs the one provided, don't waste our time and yours with personal opinions here. Odd nature 23:43, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

Odd nature, I've given up trying to debate this with you so I'm disengaging. Revolutionaryluddite 01:05, 24 August 2007 (UTC)