Buffoon, uninterrupted

Yesterday's post on the Texas State Board of Education's hearing concerning science standards (translation' The ToE, primarily) mentioned that Don McLeroy got a crack at proving that he is, indeed, still Don McLeroy.

From the link at Right Wing Watch:

One of the first people to speak was Don McLeroy, a former chairman of the State Board of Education who was prominently featured in the documentary The Revisionaries. While most people were allowed just two minutes to speak, the board let McLeroy go on for over ten minutes in a bizarre speech in which he argued that the current textbooks teaching evolution should be approved because their evidence is so “weak” that children will realize that the theory of evolution is just “words” and a “just so story," and thereby strikes a "final blow" to the theory.

WARNING: that's this thing, right here. Consider yourselves warned. I take no responsibility for any noticeable decline in your overall intelligence as a result of watching this with the sound on.

And of course, a certain scene from an Adam Sandler film needs to be added; luckily, it doesn't actually feature Adam Sandler.

Texas SBoE hearings on science textbook standards

The Texas Freedom Network helpfully posted a live blog of the State Board of Education hearings on textbook standards, and although they characterized it as a "lopsided victory for science" there was plenty of testimony by people who wouldn't know the meaning of the word "science" if it...well, free free to insert the cliche of your choice. It also Included testimony by one (very un-) usual suspect:

2:28 - Don McLeroy, former SBOE chair and leader of the creationist faction when the board adopted the controversial science curriculum standards in 2009, is about to testify. McLeroy lost re-election to current member Thomas Ratliff of Mount Pleasant in the Republican primary in 2010.

2:30 - McLeroy claims that textbooks are “filled with dogmatic” support for evolution. But he says the board should still vote to adopt the textbooks because they will somehow destroy evolution (“strike a major blow to the teaching of evolution”). Huh? He claims that while the textbooks claim solid evidence for evolution, McLeroy says, the books actually don’t do so. Yeah, sure. If it makes you feel better to believe that, Don.

 2:32 - What we see around us supports what the Bible says, McLeroy says. He claims even the textbook chapters on evolution supports what the Bible says.

 2:34 - McLeroy is essentially arguing that the textbooks make such weak cases for evolution that the only alternative is what the Bible says. (“It’s weak!”) Interestingly, the creationists serving on the textbook review teams seem to disagree. Their reviews are filled with objections that the textbooks claim that evidence shows that evolution is well-established, mainstream science.

2:38 - Thomas Ratliff, who defeated McLeroy in 2010, asks McLeroy to try explaining again. McLeroy says students will see so little evidence for evolution in the textbooks that they will think that God didn’t use evolution.

 2:40 - And with that, McLeroy’s fascinating (and nonsensical) testimony ends.

Seriously, where do they find people like The Deranged Dentist? And can we actually send him back?

Big news on the HIV vaccine front

Normally, the use of the word "vaccine" in one of my posts would usually presage my bringing up  yet another chunk of anti-vax woo being expounded by someone else jumping on that crowded bandwagon of idiots (for example, see the bizarre nonsense from Louie Gohmert, below), but not today.

From scienceblog.com:

Sumagen Canada Inc and Western University announced today that the Phase I Clinical Trial (SAV CT 01) of the first and only preventative HIV vaccine based on a genetically modified killed whole virus (SAV001-H) has been successfully completed with no adverse effects in all patients (emphasis mine). Antibody production was also boosted after vaccination.

Being a realist on this issue, I realize that this hardly a well-deserved death knell for HIV/AIDS; only a completely giddy optimist would believe that. But it's a promising start, for reasons that Medical Daily lays out here:

Since the virus was characterized in 1983, pharmaceutical companies and academic institutions around the world have attempted, yet consistently failed, to develop a vaccine. What is unique about (Dr. Chil-Yong) Kang’s vaccine is its use of a killed-whole HIV-1, which is similar to the vaccines developed for polio, influenza, and rabies. HIV-1 is also genetically engineered; this raises its safety profile and the possibility of it being produced in large quantities.

Anti-vax hysteria of a different, possibly even stupider kind

Shorter Louie Gohmert: "Hey, I want to get in on the anti-vaccination bandwagon that Jenny McCarthy and Andrew Wakefield are riding on, and I know just how to do it"!

Just for comparison's sake, this video seems to be more...er...coherent.

Georgia on my mind (just not for a good reason)

This data from the NCSE website is more than a bit disturbing, to say the least:

A new poll (PDF) of Georgia voters suggests that creationism is popular in the state. Asked "Would you say you believe more in creationism or evolution," 53% of respondents preferred creationism, 29% preferred evolution, and 18% were not sure.

I guessed I really shouldn't be surprised, since this is the bible belt we're talking about: I hardly expected the numbers to be the reverse. But 53% to 29%? Really? In 2013?

On the other hand, this is a state where people like Paul Broun get elected without so much as token opposition. An object lesson in the failure of congressional politics on the local level, I guess, but that's what happens when you let the terminally uninformed get their hands on elected office so easily. In a district that includes the University of Georgia, no less. 

Education in a backward, Third World country named Texas

You'd think that the previous removal of arch-cretin Don McLeroy from the Texas State Board of Education in a primary election might count for something in this day and age, but apparently it didn't. From the Texas Freedom Network:

It looks like the Lone Star State’s reputation as a hotbed of anti-science fanaticism is about to be reinforced. At least six creationists/”intelligent design” proponents succeeded in getting invited to review high school biology textbooks that publishers have submitted for adoption in Texas this year. The State Board of Education (SBOE) will decide in November which textbooks to approve. Those textbooks could be in the state’s public school science classrooms for nearly a decade.

Among the six creationist reviewers are some of the nation’s leading opponents of teaching students that evolution is established, mainstream science and is overwhelmingly supported by well over a century of research. Creationists on the SBOE nominated those six plus five others also invited by the Texas Education Agency to serve on the biology review teams. We have been unable to determine what those other five reviewers think about evolution.
Although 28 individuals got invites to review the proposed new biology textbooks this year, only about a dozen have shown up in Austin this week for the critical final phase of that review. That relatively small overall number of reviewers could give creationists even stronger influence over textbook content. In fact, publishers are making changes to their textbooks based on objections they hear from the review panelists. And that’s happening essentially behind closed doors because the public isn’t able to monitor discussions among the review panelists themselves or between panelists and publishers. The public won’t know about publishers’ changes (or the names of all the review panelists who are in Austin this week) until probably September. Alarm bells are ringing.

The TFN link has a full list of the intellectual lightweights in question, but it's entirely unsurprisingly that most of them are either shills for Intelligent Design (one of them - namely, Raymond Bohlin - is a research fellow of the Discovery Institute) or are avowed, open creationists. Only one (Richard White) seems less than enthusiastic about jumping up and down about his ID/creationist affiliations despite advocating the same "teach the controversy" nonsense that his comrades in arms are far more open about.

As it is, this is going to be a long, hard march to November. Then the real silliness begins.

(Also on WTTFTG)

Smokin' the creationist bluegrass

It used to be that you had to make stuff like this up, mostly for the sake of parody or research for a play (a point to be brought up later). Not anymore, though:

Supporters and critics of Kentucky’s new science education standards clashed over evolution and climate change Tuesday amid a high-stakes debate on overhauling academic content in public schools.

The article (quoted from the original at cincinnati.com, by the way) continues:

"Students in the commonwealth both need and deserve 21st-century science education grounded in inquiry, rich in content and internationally benchmarked,” said Blaine Ferrell, a representative from the Kentucky Academy of Sciences, a science advocacy group that endorses the standards.

 Dave Robinson, a biology professor at Bellarmine University, said neighboring states have been more successful in recruiting biotechnology companies, and Kentucky could get left behind in industrial development if students fail to learn the latest scientific concepts.

Now, those are perfectly reasonable points made by perfectly reasonable people working in academic fields (or advocating for them) that have considerable relevance to the subject of science education.

Now comes the bad part.

But the majority of comments during the two-hour hearing came from critics who questioned the validity of evolution and climate change and railed against the standards as a threat to religious liberty, at times drawing comparisons to Soviet-style communism.

One parent, Valerie O’Rear, said the standards promote an “atheistic world view” and a political agenda that pushes government control.

Matt Singleton, a Baptist minister in Louisville who runs an Internet talk-radio program, called teachings on evolution a lie that has led to drug abuse, suicide and other social afflictions.

“Outsiders are telling public school families that we must follow the rich man’s elitist religion of evolution, that we no longer have what the Kentucky Constitution says is the right to worship almighty God,” Singleton said. “Instead, this fascist method teaches that our children are the property of the state.”

At one point, opponent Dena Stewart-Gore of Louisville also suggested that the standards will marginalize students with religious beliefs, leading to ridicule and physiological harm in the classroom, and create difficulties for students with learning disabilities.“The way socialism works is it takes anybody that doesn’t fit the mold and discards them,” she said, adding that “we are even talking genocide and murder here, folks.”

Yep, all of the usual bizarre fundamentalist/YEC/Tea Party tics are there for the taking, if you actually want them: misused snarl words like "fascism" and "socialism", unverified anecdotal assertions about how evolution leads to "drug abuse, suicide and other social afflictions" (and I'm sure that Mr. Singleton actually has case studies in his possession that can actually prove those anecdotes, right?) and a whole slew of  accompanying gibberish that makes me wonder if any of the aforementioned speakers  have cracked open a book on science past the age of 18, much less read any of it.

Speaking of gibberish:

At one point, opponent Dena Stewart-Gore of Louisville also suggested that the standards will marginalize students with religious beliefs, leading to ridicule and physiological harm in the classroom, and create difficulties for students with learning disabilities.“The way socialism works is it takes anybody that doesn’t fit the mold and discards them,” she said, adding that “we are even talking genocide and murder here, folks.”

What?

That's the way socialism works?  Funny, but what that mushwit just described is pretty much how something like bullying works. Of course, Ms. Stewart-Gore is one of those people who probably thinks it's perfectly okay if non-Christian students are bullied for their religious beliefs, but that thought probably never popped into her head when she used the term "religious".

Likewise, the assertion that teaching real science will "create difficulties for students with learning disabilities" seems to be based on the singularly odd belief that students with learning disabilities (a dangerous, one-size-fits-all term of convenience if there ever was one) are one uniform blob of stereotypical mentally challenged gimps who can't learn anything, whether it has to do with biology or tying their own shoes. It's as if the kids who are wheelchair-bound are being thrown in the same room with those suffering from dyslexia, hyperactivity or ADD and are all classified as uneducable as a result.

Yes, people actually believe this shit. And no, I couldn't think of a word more poetic than "shit", since that's the most straightforward way of classifying this nonsense.

As mentioned before, this stuff could be the subject of a play. It has been in the past. Reading the original version of Inherit the Wind is entirely relevant. Inherit, incidentally, came out back in 1955, at the tail-end of the McCarthy era.

Feeling intellectually threatened, yet?

(Also on WTTFTG)

Fossils, fossils and yet more fossils

Ladies and gentlemen, welcome Nasutoceratops to the fold:

This year's sensation from Utah might well be another ceratopsian, Nasutuceratops titusi, known from an almost complete skull and an associated left forelimb, as well as skull fragments from two other individuals. Some skin impressions were also found with the forelimb. Nasutuceratops is still a nomen nudum (“naked name”), meaning it has not been officially and formally described in a published scientific journal yet. It has been named by Eric Karl Lund (advisor: Scott Sampson) in his Master of Science Geology thesis submitted to the faculty of the University of Utah in 2010. In a comprehensive phylogenetical analysis, this short snouted long horned centrosaurine ceratopsian was found to be closely related to the contemporary Avaceratops lammersi from Montana.

Add to this the fact that there's new evidence that anyone trying to ride a T-Rex might've made a big mistake and the whole YEC "humans co-existed with dinosaurs!" idiot lobby might have to spend a whole thirty seconds or so wrestling with intellectual inadequacy issues before posting their next  non-response to actual scientific research.    

News travels slow in Louisiana, I see...

Shorter Louisiana House of Representatives concerning the Balanced Treatment for Creation-Science and Evolution-Science Act.: "it don't matter if the Supreme Court said it's illegal back in 1981 in Edwards v. Aguillard - we're still keepin' it on the books! Yeeehah!"

Prediction: one of these days, they'll be downright scandalized that a Civil Rights Act was enacted on the Federal level back in 1964.

Better late than never: the Pigasus Awards

Okay, I admit it. I've been busy. But that's no reason not to finally get around to posting the results of the latest James Randi Educational Foundation Pigasus Awards, right?

My congratulations to Dr. Stanislaw Burzynski, the Pumpkin Hollow Retreat Center, SyFy, Alex Jones and Dr. Mehmet Oz for choosing to step in it hard and deep. Your hard work at fostering differing forms of woo and complete bullshit are a cautionary lesson in gullibility and a source of unintentional humor for the rest of us.

(Also on WTTFTG)

Higgs. Yes, *Higgs*.

Earlier in the week, there was some degree of confusion as to whether CERN had actually discovered the Higgs Boson (or the "God particle", if you so choose); apparently, they did:

We observe in our data clear signs of a new particle, at the level of 5 sigma, in the mass region around 126 GeV. The outstanding performance of the LHC and ATLAS and the huge efforts of many people have brought us to this exciting stage,” said ATLAS experiment spokesperson Fabiola Gianotti, “but a little more time is needed to prepare these results for publication.”

"The results are preliminary but the 5 sigma signal at around 125 GeV we’re seeing is dramatic. This is indeed a new particle. We know it must be a boson and it’s the heaviest boson ever found,” said CMS experiment spokesperson Joe Incandela. “The implications are very significant and it is precisely for this reason that we must be extremely diligent in all of our studies and cross-checks."

“It’s hard not to get excited by these results,” said CERN Research Director Sergio Bertolucci. “ We stated last year that in 2012 we would either find a new Higgs-like particle or exclude the existence of the Standard Model Higgs. With all the necessary caution, it looks to me that we are at a branching point: the observation of this new particle indicates the path for the future towards a more detailed understanding of what we’re seeing in the data.”

(Also on WTTFTG)