Science Reporting

Earlier today, Rob Crowther speculated that wording attributed by New York Times reporter Cornelia Dean to Ohio State Board of Education member Dr. Deborah Owens Fink was in fact wording that came from Ms. Dean, not from Dr. Owens Fink. We have just received confirmation of that fact from Dr. Owens Fink herself.

New York Times science writer Cornelia Dean continues to misinform the public about the debate over evolution, and I think she does so deliberately.

Last December I wrote a series of blog posts critiquing Judge Jones’ decision in the Kitzmiller v. Dover case. Most of the articles analyzed the text of the Kitzmiller opinion and explained why I thought it was an example of judicial activism. However, in a final post, I also criticized the newsmedia for inaccurately portraying Judge Jones as a political and religious conservative, which I viewed as an effort to shield his judicial opinion from legitimate criticism.

We recently reported how New Scientist has exhibited an incredible bias against intelligent design and is encouraging scientists to attack ID using “the weapons of sound bytes and emotional arguments… deploy[ing] all the tools that are used to sell cars, [and] diet drugs…” But the best possible proof that the media is biased against intelligent design would be a cover article in one of the nation’s leading media journals instructing editors and reporters to limit and stifle the pro-ID viewpoint when reporting on the ID-evolution debate. Precisely such an article entitled “Undoing Darwin” was co-authored by Chris Mooney as the cover article of the prestigious Columbia Journalism Review just a few weeks before the beginning of the Dover trial in Read More ›

It looks as if the reporting on evolution and intelligent design is even worse in the UK than it is here in the US. I was just forwarded this article from last week’s Independent titled “Does Creationism Have a Place in the Classroom.” Right off the bat the lead of the article makes unsupported assertions, editorializing in a manner that even some of the most agenda-driven reporting in the US has yet to do.

* The estimable cultural commentator Joseph Epstein writes in The Wall Street Journal Thursday about those “Ugly Thorny Things” called facts that have a way of undercutting “velvety and suave” things called ideas. The piece (by subscription only here) makes a fascinating observation about the way that big ideas decay in the presence of factual reality.

“Not only have the past 50 or so years been largely bereft of grand ideas, but much of the best intellectual work of the period has been devoted to eliminating the major ideas, or idea system, of the previous 100 years or so: notably Marxism and Freudianism, with Darwinism perhaps next to tumble.”

The following was posted on the Cornell IDEA Club Blog at Reply From the New Scientist: October 6, 2006 Hello Hannah and thank you for your message. We are aware of this incident and have addressed the matter internally. Celeste Biever is a staff reporter at New Scientist who covers, among other specialties, stories related to the intersection of science and culture on the topic of evolutionary biology. The exchange in question is unique in Celeste’s history with us and not representative of New Scientist reporting. We are not currently pursuing a story about your group and do not intend to publish any part of the communication Celeste initiated with you. I hope this will address any concerns you may Read More ›

Darwinists have apparently killed the proposed framework for teaching controversial issues in Ohio–at least for now.

This is an update to my earlier post about the “undercover” activities of New Scientist writer Celeste Biever. According to the blogsite of the Cornell University IDEA Club, The New Scientist has responded to our letter, characterizing the event as unique in Biever’s history and unrepresentative of New Scientist reporting. Notably, unlike some internet Darwinists, the New Scientist did not try to defend its writer’s actions.

Yesterday we reported how New Scientist writer Celeste Biever has used a fake identity to contact people for a story on intelligent design (ID). (As documented here, Biever falsely identified herself as “a student at Cornell” named “Maria” to the Cornell IDEA Club.) Apart from her latest tactics, Biever has a history of extremely inaccurate and biased reporting when it comes to the issues of evolution and intelligent design: (1) Kansas Science Standards. In an article that reads like a Kansas Citizens for Science press release, Biever falsely claimed that the 2006 Kansas State Primary elections “ousted two radical conservative school board members” and reported that the current board “opposes the teaching of evolution.” Ignoring the “radical conservative” invective, there Read More ›