Podcasts

Physicist Frank Tipler on the usefulness of refereed journals, then and now

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I really enjoyed this episode of the ID the Future podcast.

Description:

Is the only good science peer-reviewed science? Are there other avenues to present important scientific work? On this episode of ID The Future, Professor of Mathematics Dr. Frank Tipler discusses the pros and cons of peer review and refereed journals. More than fifty peer-reviewed papers discussing intelligent design have been published, but critics of the theory still proclaim a lack of peer-reviewed work as an argument. Listen in as Tipler shows how things have changed with the peer review process and what we can do about it.

About the speaker:

Frank Tipler was born and raised in Andalusia, Alabama. His first science project was a letter written in kindergarten to Werner von Braun, whose plans to launch the first earth satellite were then being publicized. Von Braun’s secretary replied, regretting he had no rocket fuel for Tipler as requested. By age five, he knew he wanted to be an astrophysicist. But he’s always been a polymath, reading widely across disciplines and into the history of science and theology. After graduating from MIT and the University of Maryland, he did postdoctoral work at Oxford and Berkeley, before arriving at Tulane in 1981.

Whenever William Lance Craig often cites a book by two physicists named “Barrow and Tipler” called “The Anthropic Cosmological Principle” (Oxford University Press, 1988) in his debates to support the fine-tuning argument.  This Tipler is that Tipler! Dr. Tipler is a master of the physics of cosmology and fine-tuning. However, I definitely disagree with him on some of his ideas.

The MP3 file is here. (17 minutes)

Topics:

  • the changing nature of refereed journals and peer-review
  • previously, the refereed journals were more about communication
  • now, ideas are not taken seriously unless they are published in these journals
  • the problem is that referees can be motivated by ideological concerns
  • before, an obscure patent official named Einstein submitted a physics paper and it was published
  • now, an uncredited person would not be able to have a brilliant paper published like that
  • today, there are so many scientists that many more papers are submitted
  • although it restricts BAD ideas, it can also end up censoring NEW ideas
  • the problem is that any really brilliant idea has to go against the prevailing consensus
  • peer-review may actually be holding back the progress of science by censoring NEW ideas
  • some referees are motivated to censor ideas that undercut their reputation and prestige
  • Dr. Tipler was told to remove references to intelligent design before one of his papers would be published
  • how scientists with NEW ideas can bypass the system of refereed journals when they are censored
  • peer-review has value when it finds errors, but not when it suppresses new ideas

I think this one is a must listen. As much as I like peer-reviewed research, it’s important to acknowledge the limitations. I think if you’re going into a debate, you definitely want to be the one with the peer-reviewed evidence. Let the other guy be the one making assertions and stating his preferences and opinions. But that doesn’t mean that the peer-review process can’t be improved – I think that it can be improved.

Here is a listing of some recent peer-reviewed publications related to intelligent design.

Commentary

Should you go see Darren Aronofsky’s movie “Noah”?

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Here’s a review of the draft screenplay from Christian screenwriter Brian Godawa.

Excerpt:

As a screenwriter of films like To End All Wars and Alleged which deal with faith, and as the author of a novel called Noah Primeval about what led up to the Great Flood, I am especially conscious of issues relating to the intersection of Hollywood and the Bible and I’ve been keeping tabs on a film that lives at that intersection, a film called Noah, written by Darren Aronofsky and Ari Handel. I’ve also watched with great anticipation as a post-Passion of The Christ Hollywood tries to come to grips with how to reach the massive faith-friendly audience and I’m concerned about the phenomenon that I see, which is films being developed for that audience by people who don’t understand it and are thus destined to fail. Then when they do fail, as expected, smug Hollywood executives declare “See, that audience doesn’t really exist.” I don’t want that to keep happening. I want films to be properly developed so that they can succeed. It is in that spirit that I offer my analysis of Aronofsky and Handel’s Noah script. I believe that it’s never too late to right a ship that is heading in the wrong direction.

Having got a chance to read an undated version of the script for Noah I want to warn you. If you were expecting a Biblically faithful retelling of the story of the greatest mariner in history and a tale of redemption and obedience to God you’ll be sorely disappointed. Noah paints the primeval world of Genesis 6 as scorched arid desert, dry cracked earth, and a gray gloomy sky that gives no rain – and all this, caused by man’s “disrespect” for the environment. In short, an anachronistic doomsday scenario of ancient global warming.

And here’s an article by Jewish conservative Ben Shapiro on CNS News.

Excerpt:

Meanwhile, Hollywood prepared to drop a new blockbuster based on the biblical story of Noah. The film, directed by Darren Aronofsky, centers on the story of the biblical character who built an ark after God warned him that humanity would be destroyed thanks to its sexual immorality and violent transgressions. The Hollywood version of the story, however, has God punishing humanity not for actual sin, but for overpopulation and global warming — an odd set of sins, given God’s express commandments in Genesis 1:28 to “be fruitful, multiply, fill the earth, and subdue it.”

[…]In a world in which consumerism is the greatest of all sins, America is the greatest of all sinners, which, of course, is the point of the anti-consumerist critique from the left: to target America. Global warming represents the latest apocalyptic consequence threatened by the leftist gods for the great iniquity of buying things, developing products, and competing in the global marketplace. And America must be called to heel by the great preachers in Washington, D.C., and Hollywood.

It’s very rare for me to recommend that people go see a movie made by Hollywood leftists, and I give this movie the same treatment. Do not spend your money on this movie. Do not give your money to the people who made this movie.

News

The Economist: SB 1062 was a reasonable protection of religious liberty

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Here’s a case for tolerance of religious liberty from a gay writer in the Economist.

Excerpt: (links removed)

Doing that seems to me to have been point of laws like Arizona’s strangely controversial SB 1062, which was vetoed last week by Jan Brewer, Arizona’s governor. Douglas Laycock, a professor of law at the University of Virginia, recently noted that the thrust of the bill was simply to refine existing state and federal religious-freedom protections. “These laws”, Mr Laycock writes, “enact a uniform standard—substantial burden and compelling interest—to be interpreted and applied to individual cases by courts. They rest on the sound premise that we should not punish people for practicing their religion unless we have a very good reason”. The point of SB 1062 in particular was to clarify “that people are covered when state or local government requires them to violate their religion in the conduct of their business, and that people are covered when sued by a private citizen invoking state or local law to demand that they violate their religion.” Mr Laycock goes on to emphasise, and this is very important:

But nothing in the amendment would have said who wins in either of these cases. SB1062 did not say that businesses can discriminate for religious reasons. It said that business people could assert a claim or defense under RFRA, … that they would have to prove a substantial burden on a sincere religious practice, that the government or the person suing them would then have the burden of proof on compelling government interest, and that the state courts in Arizona would make the final decision.

It is incorrect to claim, as my colleague did last week, that SB 1062 was “in effect, an exemption from anti-discrimination laws for the pious”. It was not. It was an attempt to calibrate the law so that worthy new legal rights don’t infringe on worthy old ones. If forcing conservative Christian photographers to shoot gay weddings can be shown to promote a “compelling interest” of the state, and if the photographer fails to show that doing so would place a “substantial burden” on her sincere religious beliefs, then refusing to work a gay weddings would remain a violation of existing anti-discrimination law. That seems reasonable to me. As Mr Laycock says, “we should not punish people for practicing their religion unless we have a very good reason”. When we do have a very good reason, we can go right ahead.

It’s important to understand that many gay people are either 1) not in favor of gay marriage or 2) not in favor of forcing Christians to affirm gay marriage. The Economist is a socially liberal, fiscally moderate publication. So I am especially glad to see an article defending religious liberty and tolerance of Christians here. Of all places. I think a lot of people are going to read that and realize that it’s worse to take away the religious liberty of Christians to not participate in activities they oppose, than for gay couples to simple go next door and get the product or service they want.

I also think that this article goes to show you how reasonable SB 1062 was as legislation.