When Seinfeld was the biggest thing on TV, I wasn’t a fan. It’s not that I dislike the show, I just didn’t watch a lot of standard prime time programming. Seeing the show in syndication, I’ve always gotten a laugh from it.
I hope Mr. Seinfeld and Mr. David will just keep counting their millions and excuse me for adapting a bit of their routine for a new program I’d like to propose: The Science Nazi.
Much like the soup-denying character from Seinfeld, the Science Nazi will have his catch-phrase: “NO SCIENCE FOR YOU!” This will be used to deny the benefits of science to those in our society who continually seek to forgo science for mysticism, spirituality and superstition.
Why do we need the Science Nazi? Have you taken a look at what’s happening in Kansas right now? A bunch of idiots promoting “Intelligent Design” are trying to make the Kansas Board of Education abandon evolution in science classes. The “Intelligent Design” guys will insist that they just want to provide an alternate to evolution, which they feel is just an unproven theory. As the great Carl Sagan once said, “Bullshit!” No, wait, that was Penn & Teller. What Sagan said was “Evolution is a fact, not a theory.” Evolutionary changes can be observed in small increments over decades in simple species such as insects, and the fossil record continues to provide us with links between complex organisms, such as the recent dinosaur find that helps bridge the gap between meat and plant eaters.
See the Intelligent Design folks make their argument without any published studies, documentation, or any of the paperwork that people making these kinds of arguments should be required to produce. They don’t say who or what the “intelligence” behind the design is because then they’d be required to provide proof of it. Basically, they want you to take it on faith that it can happen, because nature is so well organized. Yes, nature that produces two-headed snakes, flies that live for less than a day and tree-hugging marsupials that only eat Eucalyptus.
One of the other reasons the Intelligent Design folks don’t want to mention the method for the intelligence is that then they’d be forced to reveal that its just Creationism promoted by their evangelical Christian backers. I guess they just feel that Kansas, with its lack of topography, will be more open to their attempts to drag education back into the dark ages because nothing opens the mind more than a Kansas landscape.
This is why we need the Science Nazi. In a situation like this, he would walk up to the Kansas Board of Education and announce:
NO SCIENCE FOR YOU!
What’s that Mr. Board Member? You want to use your cell phone? Sorry that was only possible with the scientific discovery of radio waves.
NO SCIENCE FOR YOU!
What’s that Mr. Intelligent Design/Creationist? You want to drive your giant SUV? Sorry, gasoline is a fossil fuel from the days of the dinosaurs, which don’t exist in your Bible. Not to mention the refining process, and the workings of the internal combustion engine.
NO SCIENCE FOR YOU!
What’s that Mr. Concerned Parent? You don’t support gay marriage cause it’s “unnatural” since gays can’t breed, even though your own quadruplets couldn’t have been born without fertility drugs?
NO SCIENCE FOR YOU!
What’s that President Bush? You don’t support stem cell research and denounce global warming, yet you want to bomb places and send spaceships to Mars? Bombs and rocket fuel don’t just magically appear like the voices in your head that told you to be president.
NO SCIENCE FOR YOU!
These are just a few of the reasons why we need the Science Nazi. We need to remind people that they can’t have it both ways. They can’t have their 21st century technology, medicine and conveniences and still expect society to adhere to fairy tales from 2,000 years ago. If they want that kind of life, they can hang out with the Amish or set up a sanctuary cut off from the world like in The Village. If they are lucky and a divine source is watching out for them, maybe a bunch of them won’t drop dead from easily curable diseases.
Oh, and you, the guy right there, yes you, the one who doesn’t want kids reading Harry Potter because magic is bad, unless it’s Jesus-magic. You shouldn’t be using a computer, that’s chock-full of science and technical wizardry. Log off! Get out of here!
NO SCIENCE FOR YOU!
← Ctrl← Alt
Ctrl →Alt →
May 18 2005, 00:12:04 UTC 7 years ago
Bravo
Bravo, Doc Nuke! I agree 100%!May 18 2005, 16:08:34 UTC 7 years ago
Re: Bravo
Thanks, Nanorc! Good to see you here amongst the crazies. :)Anonymous
May 18 2005, 18:09:27 UTC 7 years ago
May 18 2005, 18:40:45 UTC 7 years ago
That sucks...
The link from my mysterious visitor mentions the death of Frank Gorshin, a great impressionist and the man who will always embody The Riddler.Perhaps I can put my dislike of Quentin Tarantino aside long enough to see Gorshin's guest appearance on the CSI finale...
Farewell, Frank, I'm doing my Riddler laugh in your honor....
7 years ago
May 18 2005, 18:40:19 UTC 7 years ago
--Kris
May 18 2005, 18:41:31 UTC 7 years ago
Go right ahead.
7 years ago
May 18 2005, 18:41:31 UTC 7 years ago
*applauds wildly*
May 18 2005, 18:43:38 UTC 7 years ago
I shall display it proudly. :)
7 years ago
7 years ago
May 18 2005, 18:42:26 UTC 7 years ago
May 18 2005, 18:44:10 UTC 7 years ago
Gee, I'm the belle of the ball today.
7 years ago
7 years ago
May 18 2005, 18:48:55 UTC 7 years ago
May 18 2005, 18:49:55 UTC 7 years ago
7 years ago
7 years ago
7 years ago
7 years ago
May 18 2005, 18:50:35 UTC 7 years ago
May 18 2005, 19:15:30 UTC 7 years ago
After they set up their sanctuary to protect them from evil science -- let's release smallpox into it. I doubt if their God meant us to exterminate something that their God had given them.
May 20 2005, 00:06:10 UTC 7 years ago
May 18 2005, 19:17:33 UTC 7 years ago
May 18 2005, 19:22:59 UTC 7 years ago
As pleasant as the thought of one of those collapsable metal baton being whipped across the face of a southern baptist patriarch is, is there actually anything that can be done in the real world to put the semiotic hurt on the antirational?
May 18 2005, 19:30:53 UTC 7 years ago
7 years ago
May 18 2005, 19:32:46 UTC 7 years ago
May 18 2005, 19:44:53 UTC 7 years ago
7 years ago
7 years ago
May 18 2005, 19:51:48 UTC 7 years ago
May 18 2005, 20:35:32 UTC 7 years ago
May 18 2005, 20:37:29 UTC 7 years ago
The best part of reading a Sagan book is hearing his voice in your head.
7 years ago
May 18 2005, 22:01:17 UTC 7 years ago
Beyond that, amusing post.
May 18 2005, 22:56:16 UTC 7 years ago
There's nothing inherently wrong with any of them, so long as you are not basing the rules of society on them.
7 years ago
7 years ago
7 years ago
7 years ago
7 years ago
May 18 2005, 22:46:09 UTC 7 years ago
May 18 2005, 23:01:42 UTC 7 years ago
May 18 2005, 23:32:47 UTC 7 years ago
The Science Nazi, however, is very much available.
May 18 2005, 23:57:03 UTC 7 years ago
May 19 2005, 14:18:02 UTC 7 years ago
Au contraire. Rather than explain it myself, I will defer to Bob Riggins, a science teacher from South Texas, and his article called Thermodynamics for Two, Please.
7 years ago
7 years ago
May 19 2005, 03:01:42 UTC 7 years ago
May 19 2005, 06:09:49 UTC 7 years ago
Stiring up the pot, my job in life.
As I don't watch mainstream TV or read newspapers, I just became aware of the term Intelligent Design only two days ago. And while I agree with Carl Sagan that evolution is fact, not theory; there are still some unanswered questions with regard to two major elements in my line of reasoning.1- the Intelligence or cause behind the Big Bang; and
2- some obvious missing links in the evolution of mankind.
Dinosaurs are obvious. We have footprints, bones, and enough fossil fuel to power automobiles for a century. But we have primates and just a few rare specimens of evolving man where there should be dinasaur amounts (well . . . proportionately).
I have proposed that "man" was genetically engineered from naturally evolving primates simply because of the lack of a multitude of evidence supporting the evolution of modern man. Man *is* evolving. We're getting bigger. We're getting taller. There are millions and millions of supporting carcasses to prove it. But where are the millions of carcasses between quasi upright man and upright man?
Fundamentalist Christians don't want to entertain the genetic engineering of human beings anymore than "scientists" do. But I think the truth lies somewhere between the two extremes. Even modern mathematicians who approach reality from the quantum level are finding an underlying Intelligence behind what appears to be chaos.
What is wrong with acknowledging this? Creationism reeks of religion. But "Intelligent Design" is a term that is at least open to investigating the intelligence behind the obviousness of evolution. If it is religion in science's clothing, shame on them. But I personally like the notion of taking into consideration that there is an intelligence that seems to pervade the universe. It is so obvious to me that to ignore it seems ignorance at its finest hour. Perhaps something was set into motion billions of years ago . . . and perhaps at some point, when a certain level evolution had occurred, someone . . . from somwhere (perhaps the same folks that set things into motion in the first place?) . . . intervened, manipulated a little DNA here and there and . . . voila . . . mankind was born.
Just a thought . . . neither of the opposing views make sense all by themselves. Remember Carl Sagan also wrote a book of fiction ["Contact"] in which he incorporated an intelligence that monitored human behavior, accessible not by space travel but by interdimensional travel. While a work of fiction, it came from the same mind that perhaps could not propose what he believed to be true to the scientific community, which can be as close minded and dogmatic as the Fundamentalists. I think the mathematicians will eventually bridge the gap. Right now they are as harranged by the hard cold scientific ("if I can't smell it, it doesn't exist") community as the Christians are. They almost work in the realm of pure mind.
I did enjoy your piece :) Very clever.
May 19 2005, 10:54:52 UTC 7 years ago
Re: Stiring up the pot, my job in life.
Sagan noted in Cosmos that if we come to the conclusion that "God created the universe" then the inevitable question is "What created God?" As he put it, the question is "too big."Is it possible that something has had a hand in the laws of nature? Possibly. Could something have manipulated genetic codes, or set in motion a series of events that led to what we know as the universe? Of course it is possible. Legitimate science would jump at the chance to find evidence of intelligence beyond what we currently understand, whether it be from another dimension, planet or even from deep within organic cells (as some would propose that mitochondria almost act as a separate entity within a living cell).
The heart of good science is an open mind. It is constantly questioning what we know, or think we know, and then seeking to prove or disprove those questions with repeated tests.
If the promoters of Intelligent Design were actual scientists, they would come forth with research, but they offer nothing beyond a plea for considering something beyond evolution, which they claim is flawed. Since they are backed by Evangelical organizations, it would seem that they have an agenda beyond trying to expand scientific horizons.
I'm glad you enjoyed the piece. Thanks.
May 19 2005, 13:54:37 UTC 7 years ago
Whether you agree with him or not, Saletan's column makes some cogent points.
May 19 2005, 18:49:39 UTC 7 years ago
Looking past that, this is funny, thanks for posting.
May 21 2005, 15:35:26 UTC 7 years ago
May 19 2005, 18:54:00 UTC 7 years ago
That's my favorite part. I just quoted that.
May 19 2005, 21:02:33 UTC 7 years ago
Shameless self plug: If you are a fan of the insanity that is Jack Chick, then feel free to brouse my archives for a series of dissections. I think you'll enjoy them.
May 20 2005, 00:08:50 UTC 7 years ago
Meanwhile, the rest of us who think both different religions and science keep each other thoughtful will sigh about being lumped with the dinks, often by the dinks themselves.
March 20 2007, 13:05:28 UTC 5 years ago
May 20 2005, 07:27:57 UTC 7 years ago
Nice thought, but...
One thing the opponents of science, whether it's the Intelligent Design-Intelligent Origin Theory (ID-IOT) crowd or the People Eschewing Testing on Animals, all assert is that the thing they oppose is not required for scientific advancement to take place.The folks at PETA will explain to you, slowly and in very small words so you can understand it, that computer models and tissue cultures are perfectly adequate for conducting research. Not only that, they're cheaper and more effective.
Never mind how tissue cultures were developed and computer models validated, or how they're checked when gaps in the software become apparent. My argument in rebuttal is a simple economic one. IF non-animal research methods are so much better, why are no labs using them to the exclusion of animal methods? Money for research is tight, and researchers are in constant competition for limited funds. If you could substitute a cheaper, more effective analytical technique, you'd be more likely to receive that grant (it'd be smaller, so they're more likely to part with the money). If non-animal methods are more effective, then consider that the people who fund research are not handing over that money as a full-employment program for researchrs. They want to see results – a cure for something, or a new fuel source, or even just a better cosmetic. They have an incentive to look for anything that might improve their chances of realizing what they want their money to produce.
If we assert that the Animal Research Establishment is conspiring to reject alternatives no matter how much better they are, someone – maybe some organization like PETA? – could establish a lab that uses non-animal research methods. Sooner or later, the increased productivity would be obvious to all, especially to those who want to see real results for the money they funnel into research proposals.
Likewise, the ID-IOT crowd can ignore the scientific basis for selective breeding, hybridization, and genetic engineering. If your perspective is sufficiently myopic, you'll never be disturbed by where the horizons lead. The ability of a person to ignore facts they don't like and feel perfectly justified in helping themselves to the results of those facts should not be underestimated.
(Also linked from my blog.)
Anonymous
May 20 2005, 18:53:13 UTC 7 years ago
Re: Nice thought, but...
Intelligent Design-Intelligent Origin Theory (ID-IOT)... I just fell in love with you.
7 years ago
← Ctrl← Alt
Ctrl →Alt →