rather than reply point-by-point to your latest message, let me
just reproduce one part of it to once again emphasize my main
concern:
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SZ>>which in addition to being THE RIGHT THING TO DO, will ultimately,
>IMO, make your position more persuasive.
I have seen no evidence that Stan is interested in making my "position more
persuasive". He has *never* AFAIK, ever supported me, either publicly or
privately. He waits until he attacks me with a post titled "petty, personal
agendas" to tell me he is really my closet supporter. Give me a break!
I can only conclude, based on the evidence of: 1) Stan's ad hominems
against me ("petty, personal agendas", "grow up", "whining", "spoiled
child" and "mean-spirited parent"); 2) muted criticism of Glenn; and 3)
uncritical support for TE/ECs generally, that Stan is really trying to get
me
to pull my punches, in order to protect his TE/ECs scientific friends from
criticism.
Maybe Stan has the best of motives in this, maybe not. I cannot tell. But
I have a right to be suspicious of Stan's `Greek gift', based on the above.
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This response from you is quite typical of your style of "discussion".
I stated that my concern is to help make your position more persuasive,
yet for some reason you refuse to accept my statement at face value.
Instead, you retreat into "I have seen no evidence that Stan is interested
in making my position more persuasive", which conveniently allows you
to continue regarding me as your enemy, for the purposes of advancing your
own agenda. WHY MUST YOU CONTINUE TO DO THIS? To loosely quote your own words
(which are so voluminous I cannot find the exact reference),
"If you continue to do so I will be forced to conclude that it is
deliberate distortion!"
And the reference above to "his (my) TE/EC scientific friends" is another
pejorative statement that you would be best served by avoiding. You were
wrong in your assumptions about my own position. Instead of simply admitting
it and saying, "Oops, I guess I was wrong. I mistakenly thought you
were a TE/EC", you expended great effort to convince me (and others?) that
based on my previous posts you had good reason to assume that I was a TE/EC.
WHY ARE YOU UNABLE TO SIMPLY ADMIT YOU WERE WRONG ABOUT THIS?
This is symptomatic of much that you have written and continue to write here.
When an error of yours or someone you agree with (Behe, Johnson, etc.) is
pointed out, you expend great effort, often marked by hair-splitting and
dubious interpretation, to defend the error and maintain that it really
was not an error at all! Similar to this was your "revisionist" interpretation
of Popper's recantation. How on earth can you know that Popper's remarks,
preserved in written form, were "tongue in cheek" at a particular point?
Do you have an audiotape of the address he gave? And why do you feel compelled
to re-interpret his remarks anyway? Why can't you accept what he, and I, and
others on this list say, at face value? You are certainly able to respond
with "Here's what he said, and I disagree, for reasons X, Y, Z,..." That
would certainly advance the discussion, and your presentation of your own
views, more than saying "That's not what he said at all. If you look at it
the right way, you can see that he was really saying the EXACT OPPOSITE!"
This technique is what is called "special pleading", and merely
distracts the reader from YOUR views and YOUR position.
Those of us in the US have experienced a lot of this kind of "spin" in the
popular political culture over the last few years, and seeing more of it
here, no matter who it comes from, is disappointing and un-helpful.
If you would stick to the scientific issues, avoid characterizing those
Christians who disagree with you as being "held captive by an empty
philosophy of naturalism/materialism", accept what people say at face value,
and simply admit your errors and move
on, I for one would look forward to reading your posts. I hope you will
do this in the future.
Stan Zygmunt