Wikipediatricians -- what a concept!

Caught an interesting post from Dr. James McGrath and his blog "Religion Prof". Professor McGrath is Clarence L. Goodwin Chair in New Testament Language and Literature at Butler University in Indianapolis.  While his blog isn't one you might think I read regularly, it certainly is.  I find his posts thought provoking, and this one certainly is:  "Wikipediatricians and Ways of Knowing".

Let's talk about Wikipedia for a moment.  I use it often and have also run up against criticism of it, usually from people who don't like their policies.  Yes, unlike what some people would like to believe, you just can't publish anything you want on Wikipedia.  There are processes, editorial policies, and rules that apply no only to those editing information, but what information can be included.  In other words, just like Encyclopedia Britannica, there are processes that must be followed.

For some background, I grew up with two sets of encyclopedias in the house and many an evening you could find my siblings and I huddled over one volume or another compiling information for school.  When I was in grade school -- even high school, I rarely questioned the encyclopedia.  However, once in college I used an encyclopedia reference in a paper just once and you would have thought the world had ended from the reaction of the professor.

That's where I got my first lesson in what an encyclopedia really was, a compilation of research, not an authoritative source -- and that you have to go to the source material for understanding.  While they are generally regarded as acceptable knowledge, when it comes to actual research and references, they are second or even third-hand information.

As a result, when I first saw Wikipedia, one of the benefits I saw was the live links to the source material supporting the articles. but I was curious as to how it stacked up against the gold-standard of encyclopedias "Britannica".  What I have found is that Wikipedia does have a slight bias to the left, especially in pages concerning corporations and governments, but, in my opinion, it wasn't a significant bias -- which may relate to my own biases; however, in scientific/technical subjects, it was as accurate as Britannica.  In some ways it is more current than a published encyclopedia because the editing is much more recent. Of course Britannica is also available online, but the currency issue still leans in favor of Wikipedia.

In 2005 Nature did a study comparing the two and found that all-in-all, they were pretty much on par as information sources:

"In the end, the journal found just eight serious errors, such as general misunderstandings of vital concepts, in the articles. Of those, four came from each site [Wikipedia and Britannica]."

Nature didn't mention any bias, but Forbes did later in a 2015 study -- but like me didn't see it as significant.  In fact one of the findings I found fascinating in the Forbes study:

"Perhaps the most interesting finding of Zhu and Greenstein's research is that the more times an article is revised on Wikipedia, the less bias it is likely to show—directly contradicting the theory that ideological groups might self-select over time into increasingly biased camps."

Yes, the most times an article is edited, the less bias is present.  Which I find very interesting since the groups that seem to whine about Wikipedia most often are groups with an ideological bone to pick, as noted in Wikipedia deserves an Award! They Annoyed the DI! Yea!.

OK, back to Professor McGrath, now that you know where I stand on Wikipedia itself.  It's not the source of information that may be problematic, but, as he puts it:

" . . . a failure on the part of readers to understand how summaries relate to the processes whereby academic conclusions are drawn."

Encyclopedias, whether print or online, are simply summaries from a wide variety of other source materials.  They are compiled by writers and editors that probably do not have the same level of expertise as the original writers.  That doesn't mean encyclopedias should be discarded.  What it means, especially in this environment of distrusting experts and the Internet's apparent democratizing of every opinion, we still need to understand that our own perspective is limited and that any single individual or group might understand some things differently than we do.  We need to grasp those not just as limitations, but as strengths.  I am not a doctor, so a doctor's medical opinion is going to be better than mine . . . and equating such expertise to an unsupported opinion on the Internet can be both dangerous and foolish.  Multiple doctors opinions would weigh even more heavily.  That's how it should be!

Like Wikipedia. the best information seems to be when it is confirmed by multiple reliable sources.  I am not talking about when all Fox News talking heads agree, but if Fox, CNN, and MSNBC are presenting similar stories, you can more than likely rely on them.  But when one source is leaning hard in one direction and the majority of the other news sources have an opposing view, you can be pretty sure the one is 'showing their slip', so to speak.  As you look at a variety of sources, you will come to find ones that tend to be more objective than others, like MSNBC and NPR over Fox News or Breibart.  But you have to experience multiple sources to figure that out.

Academic consensus, including scientific consensus, isn't the voice of one person, but the collaboration and confirmation by multiple people with a particular expertise.  If you distrust it, you always have the option to examine the source of the material yourself.  Wikipedia makes it easy, as does Google.  But do not let your perception be stuck in a rut with one source.  Branch out, you might learn something!

One of my friends is a hard-line conservative, and as the years have gone by become much more conservative than I am comfortable with.  His favorite news sources include Fox, Limbaugh, and a few specific websites.  When he tells me anything, I head out and check carefully.  As much as he will dislike reading this, I usually find his information to be biased to the extreme and often outright wrong.  Sometimes it's just a little twisted, but all too often it's simply a lie.  He doesn't seem to like it when I call him on it and he gets rather defensive -- OK more than just 'rather defensive'.  But until he figures out his usual sources aren't particularly honest, we will keep playing this game.

But therein lies the problem.  He has very few sources of information and gets told by those sources that any other sources are 'fake news', and he buys into it.  He's not learning anything, all he's doing is getting reinforcement for his own prejudices.  That's the dangerous point.

It's not Wikipedia that's a problem, but how we take information, regardless of source, and use it.  Are we learning or are we reinforcing beliefs we already have? Are we getting information from authoritative sources, or are we assigning our own form of democratizing and thinking authoritative sources and alternative sources are equal?  A doctor v. Hollywood celebrity on vaccines?  A spokesman paid for by the oil companies v. actual scientists who study climate change?  A biologist v. a lawyer?

You really need to think about who is more likely to give you good information rather than tell you something you might want to hear!

Occam's Razor Meet the Incredible Contortions of the Theistic Mind

Granville Sewell, a semi-regular contributor to the Discovery Institute's Evolution 'news' and Views (EnV) site has this little gem: "The Biggest Theological Objection to Design", it's a long read and follows a pretty winding road.  The bottom line is yet another rationalization as to the existence of evil in the world.

One of the many arguments against a deity, or maybe I should say one of the religious arguments against a deity, can be summed up in one line "Why do bad things happen to good people".  It's an argument that gets addresses pretty regularly because nothing strains a theistic belief like a catastrophe.  Be it a serious illness, a death of a loved on, or some other crisis that a theist believes should not befall them because, after all, they have been doing all the theistic-ally-correct things.  They believe, donate to their church, pray regularly, praise their version of a deity, try and bring in converts . . . you know, usual stuff theists do.  So why do bad things happen to those 'good' people?

A corollary is something we've discussed a number of times, why aren't all theists wealthy?  I mean with all the people who contribute to prosperity gospel evangelists and their billion dollar lifestyle, and get promises of wealth and financial security in return.  Why aren't all of those prayers answered?  See a trend here?

Here is where Granville's post starts getting crazy.  First off, the title, is this question really biggest theological challenge to Design?  There I have to disagree, I think it's the biggest question about religion, not just a design argument. . . since Granville claims ID is science:

"So while ID really is science, not theology,"

I do have to ask, if Intelligent Design (ID) is science, why does a theological challenge matter?  Look at history.  Theological challenges to real science are normally ignored, even the Creationism attacking Evolution was pretty much ignored until it started impacting actual science education.  Why does Granville need to address a theological challenge to something he claims is science? Unless when he says 'design', he's not talking about ID?

Granville uses the term 'design', not 'Intelligent Design', so I  wasn't sure if he's really making some sort of demarcation, but since his also says 

" . . . the absurdity of the Darwinist attempt to explain away the obvious design in Nature . . ."

I have to assume he is talking ID, particular since this line is the common fallback position of ID 'theorists'.  So that being settled, when Granville says 'design' he's talking about ID and all the baggage ID brings with it . . . especially it's religion -- so maybe Granville isn't being totally honest about ID being science?

I do find it hard to believe that this is the biggest theological challenge to ID because most theists do not subscribe to ID.  There are many reasons they haven't drank the DI's kool-aid, one of the ones I hear most often is the DI's own efforts to divorce their ID argument from their religious beliefs.  Many of the believers in ID frequently wink-and-nod when anyone claims ID is science, they know better.  After all, even with a couple of decades plus of effort, the DI has never been able to hide their religious beliefs -- books and articles are either self-published or religious imprints, meetings and conferences are at religious schools and churches, or hosted by campus ministries . . . We've talked many times about how hard it is for the DI to divorce itself from its religion, impossible as of yet.  To perform such an exorcism, they would have to produce some actual science, maybe that's what Granville is going to do?

But since he thinks this religious argument is so important, let's take a peek:

"A wonderful little article in UpReach (Nov.-Dec. 1984). by Batsell Barrett Baxter, entitled “Is God Really Good?” contains some insights into the “problem of pain,” as C.S. Lewis calls it, which I have found very useful. I will follow Baxter’s outline in presenting my own thoughts on this question, and I would like to begin with his conclusion: “As I have faced the tragedy of evil in our world and have tried to analyze its origin, I have come to the conclusion that it was an inevitable accompaniment of our greatest blessings and benefits.” "

So . . . bad things happen as an accompaniment to our greatest blessings and benefits?  So in other words we deserve the bad things that happen because without them we could never understand, or appreciate, the good?  That makes very little sense.  I love my wife, but to understand or appreciate, I have to hate others or have others hate me?  If that were true, then wouldn't the bad things be proportional to the good?  Wouldn't it also make sense that the bad things wouldn't happen to a child because a child has little appreciation for the good?  It doesn't add up, but adding up isn't Granville's desire, rationalization is.  Look at the wording:

"The laws of Nature which God has made work together to create a magnificent world of mountains and rivers, jungles and waterfalls, oceans and forests, animals and plants. The basic laws of physics are cleverly designed to create conditions on Earth suitable for human life and human development. "

He's making an argument that hinges of the laws of nature and the laws of physics being a product of the actions of a deity.  Without that, his whole premise falls apart.  Does he offer any support for that statement?  Nothing but the ordinary ID wishful thinking.  He presents it as if it is a foregone conclusion -- but it only is to someone who already shares his belief set.  It's not a valid conclusion because the theists accept it on faith, no support needed.  Everyone else look for the support and finds nothing.  It's like he's building a pyramidal house of cards, only upside down the everything rests on two cards. But there's nothing under those two cards, it's all belief, faith, acceptance without support.  How can he really believe that ID is science when the rest of his post deals with nothing but religion?

Of course, there is the usual argument of blaming the people themselves, the 'free will' argument.  It seems to be a common fallback.  Granville sums up that part of his post with this:

"Again we conclude that evil and unhappiness are the inevitable by-products of one of our most priceless blessings: our human free will."

Yes, 'free will' and like his natural world argument he starts from the premise that this is something granted by a deity.  But this doesn't explain many of the causes of unhappiness or the things we characterize as 'evil'.  Yes, much of our unhappiness can be traced to decisions made by other people -- the bully, the abusive parent, the drunk driver . . . but who decides a mother of two will get cancer; metal fatigue causes a car wreck; tornadoes, hurricanes, and earthquakes cause so much devastation and loss of life; or winds bringing down a plane full of people?  How does human free will fit those catastrophic scenarios?  I know, people like little kennie ham (owner of three Kentucky ministries) say that all disease and bad things are due to human failings and sin, particularly where a certain apple is involved.  But, once again, we are down to Granville's religious belief, not science, not design, but belief.  Is it reasonable  to believe my transgression against some religious rule brought about cancer in a women half-a-world away?

You can read the whole post, after all you have free will , but you will more than likely find what I found.  Granville arguing in favor of his religious beliefs.  Without those beliefs, his arguments, even the ones he quoted from others, fall meaningless to the ground.  It feels more like he's looking an excuse to justify the bad things and use them to rationalize his religious beliefs.

When the only tool in your toolbox is Rationalization, then that's what you tend to do.  I think I mentioned this story once before in an older post, but it bears repeating:

A man was sitting in his easy chair watching a baseball game. It was the bottom of the ninth, two outs, based loaded, and his team was down. Visually he was pretty much an Archie Bunker type. In fact you could easily picture Archie Bunker doing exactly this.

The announcer names the next batter, an African-American player and the man is livid. He goes on to proclaim the game to be over and how the next batter is a choker and can't handle the pressure of playing baseball all because of his race. . . you can easily picture this little bout of verbal diarrhea.

On the first swing of the bat the baseball the player hits it out of the park and wins the game.
The man now proclaims that the man was super-strong from all those years in the jungle.

Think about the mental gyrations that man had to go through, all to protect his prejudice in his own mind.  Granville reminds me of that story as well.  When there's no rational support, make some up . . . it's certainly easier than having to consider maybe your religious beliefs aren't all you want them to be.

Dodge Ball at the Discovery Institute

In a post over at the Discovery Institute's (DI) Evolution 'news' and Views site (EnV), "Bad Bugs, Good Designs — The Case of the Mosquito" looks like it's going to make a case for design.  Yet all it does it dodge the issue.  Remember making a case means much more than offering an opinion, you have to support it with evidence.

Quoting an article from Nature "Smart wing rotation and trailing-edge vortices enable high frequency mosquito flight", the DI does what it usually does and places an Intelligent Design spin on things.  What the paper describes is the intricate and interesting detail of mosquito flight characteristics, something that hadn't been studied to this level of detail before.  And what do you know, they discovered some new and interesting information.  So, how does one determine that this post on EnV is nothing more than the usual DI spin?

• Clue Number 1, is did the DI do any original research on the subject?  No, there is no evidence of any original research.  They took someone else's work and changed the conclusions.
• Clue Number 2, did the paper cite anything from the Discovery Institute or any similar source?  No, all citations reference actual scientific papers and articles, nothing pseudo-scientific in the bunch.
• Clue Number 3, does the DI's post offer any support for the design 'conclusions'?  No, they simple make the statement, but offer nothing in the way of support or proof other than their opinion.  In fact, look at this quote from the post:

"Others insights drawing on religious teachings could be cited, including the reply to Job from the whirlwind. Such answers, though worth exploring, drift far beyond the limited scope of intelligent design. The job of ID is to identify design, not comment on its morality. We gladly leave such matters in the capable hands of philosophers and theologians. To the objective observer, mosquito aerodynamic systems look well designed. They may not get our love, but deserve our respect."

They claim to have other papers they could cite, but due to the religious nature of those papers, the DI decided not to use them.  Ostensibly due to the limited scope of Intelligent Design, but in my opinion this is just another effort to keep distancing themselves from their religious background.  When you read real scientific papers, articles, and even postings, you never see a religious disclaimer, do you?

Another point, take a look at the second to last line, "To the objective observer, mosquito aerodynamic systems look well designed.", I added the underlining to point something out.  I, and many others have said, that Intelligent Design is nothing other than opinion and conjecture going for it.  This line supports that idea.  Instead of actually proving intelligent design is real, all they can do it point to things that look designed and make their religious claim that 'if something looks designed, it must be designed'.  In this case they declare it to be a good design, but yet no evidence to support that it is designed at all, let alone good or bad design.

One of the things I find humorous is that when someone points to something that, if it had been designed, was a very poor design, ID proponents never seem to address those issues in the same way. (Argument from poor design) For example, this post suggests that because the mosquito's flight characteristics are so special and so well-designed; therefore that somehow proves Intelligent Design.

However, Wild Bill Dembski, once a rising star of ID, clams there there is a difference between 'intelligent design' and 'optimal design', meaning that just because something may be poorly designed doesn't rule out ID. (Dembski, William (1999). Intelligent design: the bridge between science & theology. InterVarsity Press. p. 261. ISBN 0-8308-2314-X.) 

Huh?  Good design proves design, but bad design also proves design?  Do you want a bit more of  Marie Antoinette's cake, don't you think?  In other words, this whole post means absolutely nothing.  Yes, mosquito flight characteristics are interesting and unique in many ways and deserves further study . . . but, as an example of Intelligent Design?  That means absolutely nothing because even if it was uninteresting and pedestrian the DI could claim it supports design anyway.  A difference that makes no difference is no difference!

What this post reminds me most of is Michael Behe's book "Darwin's Black Box".  In it Behe discussed things like clotting factor, the immune system, and bacterial flagellum as things that are 'irreducibly complex' and therefore could not have come about through a natural process like evolution.  When faced with nearly 10 years of further research on those topics that support evolutionary origins, Without having read any of it, Behe said that research wasn't good enough. (Dover Trial Transcript, Day 12, PM, starting at 49.)

Scientists readily admit that they don't know everything about the flight characteristics of the mosquito.  This paper is an example of something the DI doesn't seem to know much about, it's called 'Research', in which real scientists explore things we don't know in order to learn more and more.

The DI wants to declare this as something really really special, therefore it has to have been designed.  But when you look at other insects, you also see special characteristics.  How about the Bumble Bee:

"Bees beat their wings about 200 times a second. Their thorax muscles do not contract on each nerve firing, but rather vibrate like a plucked rubber band. This is efficient, since it lets the system consisting of muscle and wing operate at its resonant frequency, leading to low energy consumption. Further, it is necessary, since insect motor nerves generally cannot fire 200 times per second. These types of muscles are called asynchronous muscles[ and are found in the insect wing systems in families such as Hymenoptera, Diptera, Coleoptera, and Hemiptera. Bumblebees must warm up their bodies considerably to get airborne at low ambient temperatures. Bumblebees have been known to reach an internal thoracic temperature of 30 °C (86 °F) using this method." (Wikipedia: Bumble Bee)

Bumble Bees have different, yet efficient, flight characteristics than mosquitoes. If you study up a bit you find that many groups of insects have very interesting characteristics when it comes to how their wings work.  So what's a good explanation?  Were they all designed differently or did they all evolve different characteristics?  On the one hand you have opinion offering the answer of 'designed', but on the other hand you have 150+ years of evidence supporting evolution.

Look at this one line mentioning Hymenoptera (Sawflies, wasps, and bees), Diptera (Houseflies), Coleoptera (beetles), and Hemiptera (cicadias, aphids . . .). Thousands of insect species with some similar flight characteristics.  Design or Evolution, which answer makes sense and is supported by evidence?  You can't forget the evidence part because without evidence all you have is opinion.  Before answering you might want to know there has been a great deal of research -- there's that word again, research -- about the genetics of insects, including related species and sub-species of insects.  Did you know human's share about 60% or our genes with fruit flies?  Again, before answering, how much actual research have you seen on Design?  I'm not talking opinion and religious pieces, but actual scientific research?  None!  So clearly the answer to my question doesn't support design!

Rather than do their own research, the DI simply take someone else's work and put a Behe-type spin on it.  In the future, as we learn more and more about the subject, I am sure there will be someone from the DI to tell us that it's not enough.  After all, that's a lot easier than doing any real research, isn't it?