Writing a satire suggesting cannibalism to control population is one thing. But seriously recommending killing off four billion people?
Rabbi Yehoshua Friedman, the head of the Yeshiva of Ma’aléh Efráyim, sent out an e-mail today containing a reference to an article that disturbed him a great deal. Dr. Eric Pianka, of the Texas Academy of Science, gave a speech at Lamar University recommending that two thirds of humanity be exterminated in a man-made plague because there are too many humans on the planet. Rabbi Friedman, like me, is a science fiction fan. This is what he wrote about the article:…
Article comments
26 - Jim Wynne
Ruvy,
You need to spend a little time finding out what you're talking about before you actually start talking. You might want to start here.
27 - Ruvy in Jerusalem
I read your link, Sam.
Bear in mind, if Eric Pianka thinks that eliminating nine tenths of mankind is a good idea, that doesn't bother me at all. What bothers me is that this guy got enthusiastic applause from the crowd of fellow scientists for his ideas.
Have you ever heard the phrase "cover your ass." In more polite circles, it is called CYA.
It strikes me that Mims caught the scientists at the Texas Academy of Science with their pants down. And their asses uncovered.
So now they are trying very hard to pull their torn underwear over their asses. They want to discipline Mims for daring to open his mouth. They want to characterize Pianka's remarks as humor. Sure.
It doesn't wash, Sam. I don't care how cute the panda looks. I don't buy crap out its rear end. If Pianka could afford to speak publicly, there would have been a video made of the speech.
He couldn't. The lack of the video is worth a thousand words and speaks louder than all the heathen hosannas of scientists who advocate murder and want to silence a man who called them on it.
28 - Ruvy in Jerusalem
Jim, I apologize. I outht to have addressed you as Jim.
29 - Jim Wynne
Ruvy,
No problem on the Sam thing.
What you fail to realize (or acknowledge) is that,
A) Mims is a first-degree wingnut with a long history of wingnuttiness, and
B) Pianka had given the talk in question at least six times before, and it didn't start people's knees jerking until Mims and his stupid Podunk newspaper made a big deal about it.
The title to your piece, and much of what's written in it, are ill-informed and unnecessarily inflammatory dreck, I'm sorry to say.
30 - Dawn
Ruvy, duly noted. Your stance was somewhat vague and so I had to assume you were anti-choice. Everyone has an opinion on the matter, that's for sure.
31 - Duane
Wingnuts in full, abject retreat on Pianka.
Let's see if Ruvy the Gullible has the integrity to admit when he's wrong.
Not just wrong, but actually writing in response:
If this is what "western civilization" is coming to, it not (sic) civilized at all and deserves to be overthrown.
Embarrassing ....
32 - SonnyD
Were any of those scientists volunteering to be the first to go?
33 - Victor Plenty
Still no solid evidence any of those scientists ever advocated the intentional release of any kind of plague, anywhere, ever.
Plenty of hand-waving, but no solid evidence.
Sorry, Ruvy. Your arguments don't prove anything in the absence of factual evidence from multiple reliable witnesses when leveling such serious accusations. Even if we assume Mims has attempted to be honest in his reporting, all the evidence available at this time suggests Mims is grossly mistaken about the actual content of Dr. Pianka's lecture.
34 - Duane
“I think that the Pianka affair stems from a contingent set of circumstances, and that it is because Forrest Mims happens to be an intelligent design advocate that the intelligent design advocates are so involved in this incident. In this case, he heard Pianka say some things that conflicted with his worldview, and through misunderstanding inferred things that just weren’t part of Pianka’s talk.”
--- Wesley R. Elsberry, Director with the National Center for Science Education
“I would like to make clear that Mims has dishonestly mischaracterized Dr. Pianka’s statements.... I’m not entirely sure why intelligent design proponents would find this a good bandwagon to jump on. It just seems like they want to teach people not to trust scientists.” (Italics added.)
--- Kathryn E. Perez, postdoctoral fellow with the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill Department of Biology
35 - Jim Wynne
There's more this morning on the Podunk, Texas newspaper that started all of this commotion. Seems they've deleted all references to the Pianka business from their online archives. Have a look here.
Shades of Orwell, no?
36 - TA Dodger
Wow.... Pianka was my Ecology prof at UT. He always said that a plague would come and that it would be a good thing in the long run... but I didn't know he was advocating creating the disease.
37 - TA Dodger
Is there a transcript or anything to support these accusations?
I don't know why Pianka would advocate creating a super-plague, he seemed to think that such a disease would inevitably crop up on its own and would spread quickly given population density.
38 - Duane
Jim (#35), thanks for the link. Outrageous, but not surprising. Some people think that by ignoring their mistakes, or by making records of their mistakes disappear, that the mistake will seem to have never happened. There is so little accountability.
I'm sure that if Ruvy the G had it within his power to make his silly American-scientists-are-bad post disappear, he would do just that.
39 - Ruvy in Jerusalem
Shavua Tov,
There is a newspaper in this country called Haaretz. It's your standard over-intellectuallized secular Jewish rag that takes all the "liberal" positions on things. Many a time articles disappear from its on-line edition without an explanation, paragraphs in the Hebrew articles are edited out of the English articles, etc. etc. There are all sorts of strange discrepancies. So seeing these things in an American paper do not surprise.
I did not quote this paper, nor rely on its reports. Its coverage or lack thereof is literally news to me.
I made one major mistake in this article, that I wish I could change - the title. It ought to have read "Texas Scientist Calls for Exterminating Over Five Billion People in a Plague."
I stand by what I have written. Scientists who do not feel comfortable having applauded a fellow scientist's call for the murder of nine tenths of the human race are doing what they can to cover their butts and censor the news. Perhaps the paper was threatened with a SLAPP suit. This is not unknown to happen in America.
My point is that your sense of values in the United States has deteriorated to the point where scientists can applaud such a call. Such values deserve to be overthrown, and in G-d's good time, and by His hand, they will be.
As for Mim's being a creationist - so what? If a skunk tells me that up-river a dam has burst and I better get going, I'll not dismiss the news because of the stink of the skunk. If you do, you're fools.
40 - Ruvy in Jerusalem
I repeat what I said earlier. If Pianka could afford to speak publicly, there would have been a video made of the speech.
He couldn't. The lack of the video is worth a thousand words and speaks louder than all the heathen hosannas of scientists who advocate murder and want to silence a man who called them on it.
41 - Jim Wynne
Ruvy,
You are not only irresponsible, but inexcusably irresponsible. You were wrong. Your title was wrong and your whole goddam piece was wrong. You've been offered compelling evidence to that effect but can't be bothered to investigate. Either that, or you are just an intellectually bankrupt propagandist.
The facts are available for those who are interested in facts, which means that you're probably not interested.
42 - Duane
What Jim said
Ruvy: My point is that your sense of values in the United States has deteriorated to the point where scientists can applaud such a call.
Yeah, we get your "point." Really.
But the real point, the point that stands out most clearly from the 40-some posts following your rant is that you come along with your intelligent sounding nonsense, spew misinformation that you actually seem to believe, then use it to preach your anti-science, anti-American blather. Either you are credulous in the extreme, or you are grasping at straws in order to continue to bolster your own adherence to archaic religious dogma by trying to impugn the scientific community. Feeling a little insecure?
... scientists who advocate murder...
And what is that you are advocating when you write
Such values deserve to be overthrown, and in G-d's good time, and by His hand, they will be.
What inferences shall we draw from this fire-and-brimstone foaming at the mouth R-vy?
As for Mim's being a creationist - so what?
This has been answered for you already (#34). I will paste it here for your humble edification:
"It just seems like they want to teach people not to trust scientists."
Clearly, this is consistent with your misguided agenda. That's "so what."
If a skunk tells me that up-river a dam has burst and I better get going, I'll not dismiss the news because of the stink of the skunk.
The skunk twists and distorts. You conveniently forgot about that contingency.
I stand by what I have written.
You don't have a leg to stand on.
Have some class, show some humility for once, back down off your dogmatic pedestal, and admit that you swallowed this story, hook, line, and sinker before checking its validity, simply because the story conforms to your naive anti-science bias.
43 - Ruvy in Jerusalem
Jim & Duane,
For all of your name calling, you are not able to produce the video proving your statement.
I'm relying on the words of an electronics science writer who has been impugned by his colleagues for his religious beliefs.
You're relying on the words of people with funding who don't want to lose that funding because it appears that they support something that is barbaric murder.
I have nothing to apologize about.
I'm not impressed by people with fancy degrees and titles who throw around $50 words or sycophants in their amen corner, like you two. I didn't know about Mim's religious beliefs when I wrote this and would not have changed a word because of them. They bear on this only in that a man who believes that G-d gave us life will be outraged that another man should pretend to play god and call for the murder of nine tenths of the human race.
Only neo-pagans who have lost their moral bearings would support such an idea with cheers, and attempt to censor someone who called them on it. Only neo-pagans who have lost rtheir moral bearings entirely, as these scientists at the Lamar University conference appear to, would call a man who supports the dignity of life a "wingnut."
And you are no better then they are in your arrogance and arrogation.
If you cannot see this, you truly have my pity.
44 - Jim Wynne
Ruvy,
You had choices. You could have investigated the situation before writing your little screed, but instead you chose to take the word of a known crank. What's worse is that you took his word second-hand.
That was mistake number one, but what the heck, everyone's entitled.
But then you had another choice to make. After learning that there was abundant evidence that you might be (gasp!) wrong, and that your accusations might be inaccurate and irresponsible, you could have chosen to retract, or at least say, "Let me look into this and get back to you." But you chose to ignore and deny, thereby scuttling any hope for credibility that you might have been able to salvage.
Personally, I'm glad to see you stood your ground because it proves beyond doubt to anyone with an unprejudiced brain that you think that hand-waving, non sequiturs and hyperbole are acceptable substitutes for thoughtfulness, reasoning and objectivity.
Good job.
45 - Ruvy in Jerusalem
Jim,
I did look into this. Both before and after writing this article. I read your links as well as others, checking out on Google for Mims - Creationism, etc.
I did not look into the newspaper article because my source for this information was the Citizen Scientist. And they have pulled nothing off of their website. Go check yourself. The link in my article still works just fine.
In all truth, the people at the link you gave me sounded like what you descibe me as - a bunch of paper waving liars filled with arrogance and self importance - who had been caught with their pants down.
Produce the link to the video showing what Dr. pianka said at Lamar University, and if what you said is true and Mims is the liar, I wll retract my words.
Until then, I stand by what an outraged man with a conscience reported.
You are entitled to think what you wish.
46 - mike
overpopulation is a myth, poverty, disease and polution stems from the misgovernment and misuse of resources, the true source of misery. control the government, control polluters, creat financial incentives for clean environment
47 - Victor Plenty
Ruvy's argument relies on the classic fallacy of affirming the consequent. If in reality Dr. Pianka had said what he is accused of saying, Ruvy argues, he and his colleagues would now be feeling that their funding is at risk, and would now deny what was said.
This argument proves nothing, simply because all those scientists would also contradict the accusation if it were in reality a false accusation.
Ruvy says a videotape is required to prove the professor innocent of the charges laid against him. I say a videotape is required to prove him guilty.
None of Ruvy's links prove anything of the sort. I read them and saw no verifiable evidence that anyone had ever advocated intentional creation of a plague. That story begins and ends with Mims, who is obviously mistaken about the real content of the lecture he attended, and is not a reliable witness.
The incident with the video camera also proves nothing about the content of the speech, although it clearly excites the conspiracy-theorist mind.
48 - Jim Wynne
An update--according to The Questionable Authority, the Pianka stories were removed from the website of the Seguin, Texas Gazette-Enterprise inadvertently and are back now. (See #35 above.) Shades of Orwell, not.