Casey Luskin and the Inappropriate Scare Quotes

PZ has done a splendid job of disemboweling Casey Luskin’s silly screed about my op-ed from yesterday’s Albuquerque Tribune.

Speaking of me, Luskin complains

He says that the “creationists” are getting “sneakier,”…

But, readers of the Thumb already know this is exactly what’s happening. This is a totally inappropriate use of “scare quotes“, and I’m calling Luskin on it.

As I discussed in “Cheshire Cat” Creationism in New Mexico, the very “science-y”-looking website for the “New Mexico Science Foundation” is simply a front for the young-earth creationists at the Creation Science Fellowship of New Mexico (CSFNM).

To see why Luskin’s scare quotes are silly, just take these steps: (1) Browse the science-y-looking “New Mexico Science Foundation”website.

(2) Copy the domain name, www.nmsciencefoundation.org, into any convenient WHOIS utility. See that the registrant is Mark Burton, with e-mail address principlesATintegrity.com

(3) Do a Google Search for “Mark Burton” NM, and follow the links to Burton’s Christian home-schooling website, his involvement in the creationist debate with NMSR, or his long-standing association with the Creation Science Fellowship of NM.

(4) If your name is Casey Luskin, go look up the definition of Q.E.D.

By the way, Luskin made no mention of my favorite point in the op-ed:

Look out for complaints that simply teaching the scientific method - testing real-world (natural) explanations - somehow denies even the possibility of a guiding intelligence above it all. Science is not “atheism” just because it cannot invoke supernatural causality.

Only a few days left in the Legislative Session. So far, so good.