> If one tells what he thinks is the *truth*, yet he is wrong, then that is
> only a *mistake*.
As Stephen should know, there are three ways to lie.
The first way is to know the truth, but to deliberately tell a falsehood.
The second way is to know the truth, but to deliberately refrain from telling
it even if you do not tell a falsehood instead.
The third way is to not know the truth, but to deliberately refrain from
learning the truth, because you prefer a favoured, plausible story instead of
the truth.
In my opinion, many creationists and ID theorists engage preferentially in
the third kind of lie, so that if exposed they can claim that all they are
guilty of is making an intellectual mistake. The problem with this excuse is
that they could have readily avoided making the mistake had they wanted to;
instead, they did not want to avoid making the "mistake" because they didn't
want to put themselves in the situation of knowing the truth and thus having
to lie when they told their falsehood. In other words, they do not want to
know the truth so that they can later claim that they did not know that what
they said was a falsehood. The problem is that it is just as much a
falsehood if you do not know whether it is true, but refuse to find out if it
is true.
To be a true mistake you would have to make the effort to find out what the
truth is, but end up being mislead by incorrect information. In my opinion,
this is what happens to the majority of creationists and ID supporters. They
trust their leaders to tell them the truth and so believe that what they are
being told is the truth, when in fact it is not. This makes them gullible,
but not liars.
Kevin L. O'Brien