Thoughts in a Haystack

I don't know what to say ... but, fortunately, that won't last.

Just when you think Casey Luskin can't possibly get more inane or more transparently dishonest or more stunningly stupid or some mind-boggling combination thereof, he manages to top himself ... this time in spectacular fashion.

The occasion is another rant at the Discovery Institute's Whine and Jeez blog, this time about how the ACLU misquoted the Wedge Document during the Kitzmiller case, which was then picked up by Judge Jones in his decision, to the effect:

The Wedge Document states in its 'Five Year Strategic Plan Summary' that the [Intelligent Design Movement's] goal is to replace science as currently practiced with 'theistic and Christian science.'

Au contraire! cries Casey:

[T]he "Wedge Document" nowhere says "theistic and Christian science." Instead, it calls for a "science consonant with Christian and theistic convictions." There is a world of difference between these two phrases. The actual phrase merely seeks for science to be "consonant with" (i.e., harmonious with) theistic beliefs and this view in no way offends the scientific method.

It is only supposed to be harmonious with science? Let's look at the entire paragraph the phrase comes from:

The social consequences of materialism have been devastating. As symptoms, those consequences are certainly worth treating. However, we are convinced that in order to defeat materialism, we must cut it off at its source. That source is scientific materialism. This is precisely our strategy. If we view the predominant materialistic science as a giant tree, our strategy is intended to function as a "wedge" that, while relatively small, can split the trunk when applied at its weakest points. The very beginning of this strategy, the "thin edge of the wedge," was Phillip Johnson's critique of Darwinism begun in 1991 in Darwinism on Trial, and continued in Reason in the Balance and Defeatng Darwinism by Opening Minds. Michael Behe's highly successful Darwin's Black Box followed Johnson's work. We are building on this momentum, broadening the wedge with a positive scientific alternative to materialistic scientific theories, which has come to be called the theory of intelligent design (ID). Design theory promises to reverse the stifling dominance of the materialist worldview, and to replace it with a science consonant with Christian and theistic convictions.

Since when is cutting off something and replacing it in order to reverse its effects merely being "harmonious" with that thing? And what was to replace the science that is supposedly the source of the "materialistic worldview" except the "Christian and theistic convictions," posing under the euphemism of "science"?

Whatever small justifiable criticism the DI might have had about the less-than-exact phraseology of the ACLU and the Judge is more than outweighed by the justness of their characterization of the intent of the Wedge Document. Luskin's attempt to paper over and hide the clear sense of the passage is what is known in the law as "evidence of the consciousness of guilt."
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