How to find a hidden religious agenda

[alfredo]

A short handy guide to buzz words by the ID and creationist adherents.

http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg20126975.800-how-to-spot-a-hidden-religious-agenda.html


Red flag number one: the term "scientific materialism". "Materialism" is most often used in contrast to something else - something non-material, or supernatural. Proponents of ID frequently lament the scientific claim that humans are the product of purely material forces. At the same time, they never define how non-material forces might work. I have yet to find a definition that characterises non-materialism by what it is, rather than by what it is not.

[patrice]

1. Uh . . . if Darwin did cause the Holocaust, wouldn't that be evidence that he was correct?

[alfredo]

2. Elaborate

[patrice]

3. Just a hypothesis. Haven't really thought it through yet.

Just brainstorming here: They are saying that thinking-Evolution-is-accurate leads to the Holocaust. Is it the thinking alone that does this? No. It has to be thinking invalid Evolution-thoughts that causes the Holocuast. So how do errors regarding the heritability of physical traits get from physiology to ushering people into slave camps and gas chambers?

Where did whatever it is that caused the Holocaust come from? If Evolution is wrong, how can the cause come from biology? If Evolution is wrong, wouldn't the cause HAVE to be that Intelligent Design-thingee? What's so "Intelligent" about killing 6 million Jews, or 1 million Iraqis for that matter, who didn't need killing?

[alfredo]

6. It's not evolution per se, it is the straying from the "word of God."

Christianity is always redefined to become acceptable when one of their numbers commits some unspeakable crime in their name and it brings bad press.

[Odin2005]

4. New Age quacks and kooks spew BS about :"evil scientific materialism" too...

...whenever someone in the reality-based community questions the BS.

[alfredo]

5. Pick up a rock, bounce it off their head and ask them if

the rock was a statement of fact, or an unproven theory.