No, I don't mean Randy Olson's self-indulgent documentary. Funny though it was, it gave too much credibility to the creationists.
Rather, I'm strongly recommending a short little book by Barrett Brown and Jon P. Alston, Flock of Dodos: Behind Modern Creationism, Intelligent Design & the Easter Bunny (Cambridge House, New York). Brown is apparently an Austinite though I don't think I've ever met him. Alston is a UT alumnus, showing that there is some hope for our students.
Flock of Dodos is the funniest book on ID I've read in a long time. (Well, Brown writes for National Lampoon, Cracked, Jest, etc.--so what do you expect?) Alston, by comparison, seems to be a rather sedate sociologist from A&M. Brown and Alston take on both New Earth creationism (now represented ny the aptly-named Ham) and its ID counterpart. The sections on Dembski, Behe, and Meyer are particularly brilliant. (Dembski finds himself cast in the possibly familiar role of the Uptown Girl in Billy Joel's stunningly irritating song by the same name [pp. 88 -90].)
Our local creationists, Koons and Budziszewski, get the Full Monty for their worship of Dembski (pp. 86 -88). It's unfortunate--and embarrassing--that the homophobic Budziszewski keeps on getting identified as a member of the Philosophy department at UT. He does have a courtesy (zero-time) appointment here (perhaps we're being courteous to Gawd) but in my ten years here I've seen him only once, when he was lying before the Texas State Board of Education in 2003.
There's much more. Read this book.
Wow, this is the first time a member of the UT faculty has said anything nice about me!
Posted by: Barrett Brown | 31 July 2008 at 16:53