Science and Culture Today | Page 1259 | Discovering Design in Nature

Steven Novella has a post in which he discusses recent experiments in which scientists induce the perceptions common to out-of-body experiences (OBE’s), which are experienced by many people and are generally thought to be of mystical or spiritual origin. Dr. Novella:

New research builds upon the growing body of research into how our brains give us a sense that we are inside our bodies. That is one of the brain’s functions that we take for granted — and do not even realize that it is a function of the brain or that it is necessary — until it is not functioning. When that happens we have an out-of-body experience (OBE)…
Prior to modern neuroscience, OBEs were interpreted as mystical or spiritual experiences. In many cultures they were provoked by drugs during spiritual rituals. They have also been reported during certain dream states and in near-death experiences.

The eco-science community was rocked last week by the revelation of a scientific paper published in 1972 by presidential science advisor John Holdren. The paper, published in Eco-Science Proceedings, correctly predicted atmospheric CO2 levels for the month of March 1972.

It’s been called “The Veracity Incident,” and it has scandalized the eco-science community. There have been several calls for Holdren’s resignation, and organizations such as the Ecological Defense Fund and the Sierra Team have demanded an explanation from the embattled Presidential Science Advisor.
The outrage was summed up by Eugene Birkenstock, of the Sierra Team Malaria Memorial Calendar Project, which is an eco-charity that sends beautiful Sierra Team Memorial Calendars to the families of the 1.5 million children in the Third World who die of malaria each year since DDT was banned in 1970.

For decades, the eco-science community has scrupulously avoided veracity in its scientific predictions. Our forbearers have set the standards in the 1960’s and 70’s: Rachel Carson, Paul and Anne Ehrlich, Nigel Calder, George Wald, and John Holdren. Scientific accuracy on the part of an investigator calls into question the investigator’s commitment to eco-science. We have standards.

Birkenstock notes that the standards set by the pioneers are high. He handed this commentator an honor roll of scientific eco-predictions:

“65 million Americans” will die of starvation between 1980 and 1989, and by 1999 the U.S. population would have declined to “22.6 million”. Paul Ehrlich, 1968

“The battle to feed humanity is over. In the 1970s the world will undergo famines . . . [AND] hundreds of millions of people [including Americans] are going to starve to death.” Paul Ehrlich (Holdren’s co-author and mentor) 1968

“Smog disasters” in 1973 might kill 200,000 people in New York and Los Angeles. Paul Ehrlich 1969

“I would take even money that England will not exist in the year 2000.” Paul Ehrlich 1969

If you needed more evidence that the Darwin lobby wants to turn science education into little more than unquestioned propaganda, take a look at the outlandish new “study” evaluating state science standards published by two officials of the National Center for Science Education, the leading Darwin-only lobbying group. Published by a journal devoted to the one-sided teaching of evolution, the article by Louise Mead and Anton Mates condemns various states for filling their science standards with “dangerous” words and “creationist jargon.” Just what are these “dangerous” words that must be banned? “Assess,” “Analyze,” “Evaluate,” and “Critique.” No, I’m not kidding. Evolutionists typically claim that the evidence for modern Darwinism is “overwhelming.” But they act as if they know that the Read More ›

Ben Stein probably thought he could do his work on the film Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed and not himself endure the kind of personal attacks that, in the film, he defended Darwin critics against. In fact, what he found was that Darwinism is at the root of the worldview of the materialist Left and even the materialist Right. You can’t say or do anything to offend them. You can’t even advocate academic freedom. The people who demanded free speech in the 60s and shouted down figures of authority are now the tenured faculty and newsroom editors of the Establishment. And now they are disallowing any criticism at all. So, unlikely as it seems, Ben Stein became a martyr. Richard Dawkins Read More ›

Sometimes the hollowness of contemporary conservatism gets me down. An earlier figure in the conservative tradition, Whittaker Chambers, began his journey up from Communism one morning when he was feeding his little daughter and he noticed her ear. Suddenly he felt the power and beauty in its evident design, and this transformed his whole view of reality.
His political philosophy is summarized in the sentence from Witness, “Political freedom, as the Western world has known it, is only a political reading of the Bible.” Perceiving that his daughter’s ear reflected purpose, intelligence, and design made it possible for him to turn from Marx to Moses, and the rest of Scripture, for illumination.

Compare the timeless wisdom of Chambers with two respectable modern-day conservatives who write on bioethics.

A new video, Journey Inside The Cell, launched today dramatically illustrates the evidence for intelligent design within DNA, as described in Stephen C. Meyer’s book, Signature in the Cell: DNA and the Evidence for Intelligent Design (HarperOne 2009). The original animation by Light Productions reveals in intricate detail how the digital information in DNA directs protein synthesis inside the cell, revealing a world of molecular machines and nano-processors communicating digital information.“This video is going to make things worse for critics of intelligent design,” Dr. Meyer explains. “They will have more difficulty convincing the public that their eyes are deceiving them when the evidence for design literally unfolds before them in this animation.” Narrated by Meyer, the video is a short Read More ›

The anti-ID crowd has an old canard about there being no serious scientists who doubt Darwin, let alone any that support intelligent design. And they like to say that there is no science being done by ID scientists. Both ideas are not just false, but absurdly so. Note this announcement of new scientific arrivals at Biologic Institute. Professor Matti Leisola, the Dean of Chemistry and Materials Science at Helsinki University of Technology in Finland; Colin Reeves, Professor of Operational Research in the School of Mathematical and Information Sciences at Coventry University; and Professor Stuart Burgess, Head of the Department of Mechanical Engineering at the University of Bristol.

In case you were wondering about that radicalism of Global Warming Climate Change fundamentalists, the President’s new science czar John Holdren made some recent assertions that should put your doubts to rest.

In a July 2008 interview on the leftist television program Democracy Now!, Holdren reiterates conventional Malthusian alarmism, complete with a running video of wildfires, storms, and floods positioned over his left shoulder. He takes shots at global warming Climate Change ‘deniers’ (at about 3:20 into the video), attributing the success of skeptics to “the preoccupation of the media with balance and with controversy”.
“Balance” and “controversy” are a bête-noire for climate alarmists.

Further into the interview (at about 7:45 into the video), the moderator raises a question about the recommendation of climate alarmist and top NASA climate scientist James Hansen that the chief executives of oil companies to “be tried for their role in spreading disinformation on climate change”. Hansen recommended that they be indicted and tried for “crimes against humanity” if they continue to “dispute” and “to fund contrarians”.

The moderator asked Holdren:

In the growing public debate about coercive population control policies and Presidential Science Advisor John Holdren, it is important to read exactly what Holdren (and his co-authors Paul and Anna Ehrlich) wrote in their 1977 textbook Ecoscience.

The question is this: were Holdren’s recommendations merely the academic exercise of listing other people’s recommendations (with disavowal or without any kind of endorsement), or did Holdren endorse any of these measures or counsel serious consideration of them.

Here are the relevant pages of Holdren’s book; there is much more than I can deal with in this post, and I will be reviewing all of Holdren’s writings in Ecoscience in future posts, word for word.

Let’s begin. Holdren bottom of first paragraph, p786):

In LDC’s [less developed countries] a childless or single lifestyle might be encouraged deliberately as the status of women approaches parity with that of men. Although free and easy association of the sexes might be tolerated in such a society, responsible parenthood ought to be encouraged and illegitimate childbearing could be strongly discouraged.

How could illegitimate childbearing be “strongly discouraged”? Holdren continues:

One way to carry out this disapproval might be to insist that all illegitimate babies be put up for adoption- especially those born to minors, who generally are not capable of caring properly for a child alone. If a single mother really wished to keep her baby, she might be obliged to go through adoption proceedings and demonstrate her ability to support and care for it. Adoption proceedings probably should remain more difficult for single people than for married couples, in recognition of the relative difficulty of raising children alone. It would even be possible to require pregnant single women to marry or have abortions, perhaps as an alternative to placement or adoption, depending on the society. [emphasis mine]

Holdren’s next paragraph is astonishing:

In the media, it’s not unusual for an interviewer and interviewee to hold similar views on whatever subject they are discussing. Radio show hosts and podcasters, for example, commonly interview friendly guests. But imagine if Paul Allen interviewed Bill Gates on the merits of Microsoft, and then published the interview as an independent journalistic article in Wired magazine. Not only would it would read like a paid advertisement, but critics would begin wondering if Wired was in business to promote Microsoft products. The Microsoft example is of course fictional, but something like it happened recently when Karl Giberson (executive vice president of the BioLogos Foundation) interviewed Francis Collins (the president of BioLogos), and then published the interview in Christianity Today‘s Read More ›