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Letter to the Editor
By:
Posted: 5/4/07
It's disheartening (though revealing) when people demonize their
opponents in order to argue against them. Anika Smith and Sarah Levy
wrote a serious article defending intelligent design (ID).
Unfortunately, SMU biology professor John Wise has chosen this
demonization approach, opening his rebuttal (published on 4/25/07) to
Ms. Smith and Ms. Levy by stating, "Deceptive tactics seem to be a
recurring theme at the Discovery Institute," and continuing for the
entirety of his response to supply nothing more than a string of
misdirected or misinformed ad hominem attacks. For someone who claims
that he "personally do[es]n't care how [Anika] refers to herself," Wise
certainly devotes an awful lot of time and energy to impugning her
integrity on how she refers to herself (five of his six paragraphs, to
be exact, deal with this issue).
Wise suggests that Discovery's Anika Smith was deceptive because she
co-authored an article in The Daily Campus which identified her as a
"recent graduate of Seattle Pacific University." He suggests that
perhaps she "purposefully meant to hide" and intentionally "omi[t]" her
"relevant affiliation" with Discovery. This ad hominem charge is
baseless.
In fact, it was the SMU The Daily Campus that wrote Smith's byline on
her article, and the DC wrote it using the information they requested
from Ms. Smith. The Daily Campus was very specific in its request for
author information. According to what Ms. Smith told me, "They asked
for my name, head shot, e-mail address, and university affiliation.
That's what I sent them. If they had asked for my employer, political
affiliation, ethnicity, or income level, I'd have given them that as
well, but they didn't. They wanted my university affiliation, and
because I have no reason to hide the fact that I graduated from Seattle
Pacific University (go Falcons!), I gave it."
Providing straightforward answers to straightforward questions is not
deceptive, and Dr. Wise's ad hominem attacks distract from the real
issues in the debate. Moreover, it's not like Ms. Smith tries to hide
her affiliations: she writes regularly for Discovery's widely read
blog, Evolution News & Views, and is listed on our staff page. It
obviously wasn't too hard for Dr. Wise to discover and verify her
affiliations. Dr. Wise has reached out to defend his viewpoint by
attacking others (but conspicuously not rebutting their viewpoint), and
he failed.
Not content to simply make baseless character attacks against Anika
Smith and the Discovery Institute, Wise turns to a nearly graduated law
student at SMU, Sarah Levy, wondering "if there are any important
ethical questions to be asked of … a third year law student here at
SMU?" It is most disturbing that a professor would publicly question
the integrity of one of his university's own students simply because
she co-authored an article supporting Intelligent Design.
Anyone interested in more detailed responses to Wise can visit
Discovery's Web site at discovery.org/csc and also our daily blog
Evolution News & Views at evolutionnews.org. But be careful if
you're a student defending ID at SMU. Dr. Wise is watching you.
Sincerely,
Casey Luskin, Esq.
cluskin@discovery.org
© Copyright 2007 Daily Campus