Re: Well-financed creationists?

Susan B (susan-brassfield@ou.edu)
Thu, 14 Oct 1999 21:00:45 -0500 (CDT)

>>Glenn:
>>
>>"The problem is, as Joel put it so well, the ID movement isn't interested in
>> the real world. By that I mean, they must present a testable hypothesis,
>> which means they must tell the funding agency what they think happened in
>> the past. They can't get funding for telling the funding agency, "I don't
>> believe evolution happened, I don't know how life occurred, I don't know
>> how life changes/evolves, I don't know whether geology and paleontology are
>> correct or not, but I want lots of money to run experiments to confirm what
>> I don't know." As we say down here in Texas, 'That dawg won't hunt'."

MikeBGene wrote:
>>Like I said, it would be nice if we could test this to see if you are right.

Glenn:
>Until the ID movement has something to be tested, it is an untestable
>proposition.

almost anybody can write a grant proposal. All you have to do is lay out
your hypothesis, explain your experiment design, etc. Grants are awarded on
merit. I'm sure the ID people would say that they would be discriminated
against because their ideas are not "mainstream" but I have a hunch that
there are a lot of conservative foundations that would love to fund such a
grant. Once privately-funded grants started showing positive results,
published papers, etc. it shouldn't be all that tough to get government
grants to support further research.

The problem is, that most of the ID "scientists" can't come up with a causal
*e-mail* describing the kind of hypothesis they'd like to test--and how they
would test it--if they could get their hands on some money, let alone a
carefully-crafted grant proposal.

Susan
--------
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