Clear the Mud

I am still trying to feel out how best to do this thing here. But here's an intro to where I'm coming from.

My frequency posting here will likely start out low.

Whether it stays low or not is a separate issue...

Anyways... the introduction.
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I used to love it, then I didn't:
It's only been recently that I've regained enough of an interest in the sciences to really comment on them.

It's amusing to me and at least one of my old grad school friends that, after almost three years away from the sciences, this should happen.

See, while in the midst of in-the-weeds benchwork, there were periods where I was so bummed about some technical problem or other, that I often avoided all science reading outside of my little world. It just made me sad for reasons I won't go into right now.

So I would learn all about things very specific to my work but which would mean almost nothing to anyone walking in off the street.

And then, for many and varied reasons, I left the sciences, resulting in me having a PhD mainly for decorative purposes.

What woke me up a bit - people with megaphones and no truth:
So, for a while, when science-type or medical-type issues came up, I generally held my tongue or, more often, just walked on by.

But I'm learning one thing about myself. I don't sit well when there are issues that I happen to understand a bit and yet others, who by their words know very little if anything, use a public stage to spout off misinformation or out-and-out lies.

Now, as in politics, people using these tactics in anti-science or anti-medicine crusades are usually doing it for a reason. This group is sometimes countered by an opposing group which attempts to promote discussion to demonstrate why the first group might be slightly off-base in their claims. But they, themselves, are not likely to change their tune no matter how much reasonable discourse is offered. Their minds are made up and all things that exist in the world do so in order to prove that person's worldview is absolutely correct.

Little can be done in those cases. That's usually not so bad, because the number of such people is relatively small. Unless, of course, they have a megaphone.

That's when the real danger begins. It's the third, and by far the largest, group of folks - the ones who don't know the details of the argument - who are in danger of being turned toward believing the ones with the loudest voice. This becomes especially likely if those attempting to propagandize are armed with single bits of selective information or carefully chosen quote snippets, sometimes from "authorities", sometimes from the person or group they are attempting to demonize.

And, look, I'm aware we all do things like that, differing mainly in degree of duplicity and target of our attack. Some people will almost over-cautiously couch their rhetoric to remain truthful, fair, and allow for a benefit-of-the-doubt - practically negating the argument. Some will fire away but then retract the more glaring errors of their words. Others will feel no concern for such niceties and will let the bile fly far and wide, without regard to accuracy or hypocrisy.

I suppose it's the last group that concerns me the most. Certainly when it comes to the topic of science and medicine.


The Big "E":
Not surprisingly, this has come up in the context of biological evolution of species, being an absolute fact of nature, the mechanisms of which are still under reasonable scientific debate.

I remember what got me started noticing this - sort of lifting the fog from my brain in regards to attacks on reality.

As I was poking around the web one day, I stumbled on a post or something which proudly claimed they had the proof - PROOF! - that evolution was false.

Wow. OK, this could revolutionize science. How exciting. What was it?

It's called the Second Law of Thermodynamics.

Um... really?

I remember reading this and just... scratching my head.

See, it'd been a while since I cracked open a physics book but, among other things, these concepts of thermodynamics have been around for a while. You'd think if it somehow managed to concretely disprove evolution, someone might have brought it up - and more importantly, proved it.

And, upon reading the explanation, I began to see that the person explaining this "undeniable proof" didn't understand much about biological life or, I suspected, physics. Others have gone in-depth to destroy this particular argument, but I'm happy to discuss the basic argument and the simple reason it doesn't make any sense as a post at some point soon.

Anyway, ok, thermodynamics is kinda over the head of me and most other folks, so I could just let it pass.


However, as I kept poking around, I saw more and more things that truly disturbed me.

Selective quoting, fact-mining (picking just the one bit that makes it sound like you're right), or complete lies.

• Evolution claims we came from mud! (it doesn't)
• Evolution claims whites (or whomever) are "superior"! (it very much doesn't)
• Charles Darwin claimed in his own book that natural selection couldn't work! (Really?!?)
• An astronomer said evolution is false! (He also said the Universe is not expanding. Wrong on both counts. Right about the formation of atoms in stars, though!)
• There is no fossil evidence that evolution occurred! (except for the thousands of fossils)
• Evolution doesn't explain gravity (True. It also doesn't explain why Nixon was such a creep, Ben Stein, so that's two points from Evolution, I figure.).
  
• There are NO CROCK-A-DUCKS!!! (WTF? Oh my God!)
  

... and on and on and on---- and ON AND ON AND ON.

Oh, and it's amazing how many directions they come from, pulling random bits from every corner of the intellectual realms - places no one else would even have dreamed of (ie, thermodynamics). And yet, each one simply ends up proving the point that the basics of evolution have held up for a century and a half for a reason.


The one that was one too many:
But there was one that just finally and completely pissed me off when I read it.

It pissed me off royally because anyone who knew ANYTHING about the science he is criticizing would know this is false.

The claim is this:

Natural selection, if it were real, would depend on mutations occurring in animals, plants, etc.
Any change in DNA is bad.
Mutations are bad.
They make mutant babies.
Most die at birth. The rest rarely mate.
So mutations can't drive evolution.
Therefore, evolution is false.

Wow.

Look, people, if you don't know even the most basic facts of a topic, you shouldn't be criticizing it.

This applies to politics, personal life, electrical work, and for the love of all things, people, the ultimate fact-based thing: science!

Of course, when has that ever stopped anyone from mouthing off before. Yeah, I've done it, too.

But anyway, it was this basic lie - that mutations are all bad and/or lethal - that sort of did it for me. It is such a breathtakingly wrong statement, so demonstrably false, that no one with even basic biology training could actually come up with it.

And if they didn't have that training or, better yet, didn't bother to look it up from an authoritative source - because everyone needs a refresher - then why on Earth would they say such a wrong thing and not expect to be called on it?

All that made me decide to start from this point - the question of mutations - and work sideways.

I figure I could do my teeny-tiny little part and at least address some of these deceptions, one-by-one, in my own fashion and for whatever small bit of good it might serve.


So I started with the simple fact that each and every one of us is, in fact, a mutant.

... and then we'll see where it goes from there.