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Evolutionary Informatics Media Coverage: Baylor, Robert Marks, and the EvoInfo Lab
| September 21, 2007 | Posted by William Dembski under Intelligent Design |
Media attention continues to focus on the Baylor administration’s censoring of Prof. Robert Marks’s Evolutionary Informatics Lab (now on a third-party server at www.EvoInfo.org). With the coming to campus of a crew from Ben Stein for his forthcoming movie/documentary EXPELLED: NO INTELLIGENCE ALLOWED, things have ramped up further.
Baylor President John Lilley continues to dig in his heels, refusing to let the Evolutionary Informatics Lab back on campus. Baylor is simply playing a waiting game until the present wave of media interest dies down, after which the removal of Prof. Marks’s website from the Baylor server can quietly be forgotten.
In a better world, the Baylor administration would apologize to Prof. Marks and restore his site with no more restrictions than any other researcher at Baylor faces.
Media Coverage:
- September 21, 2007: “Film Crew Presses Baylor Officials on Intelligent Design Web Site’s Removal” — Front page story in Waco Tribune-Herald. The article presents the Baylor administration as claiming that “a deal is in the works.” Nothing the Baylor administration has done to date suggests this to be the case.
- September 21, 2007: “ID Talks Fail to Satisfy” — Baylor student paper reports on EXPELLED crew coming to campus.
- September 20, 2007: “Editorial: Lilley’s Two Cents Are Missing” — Amazing editorial in the Baylor student paper criticizing President Lilley for being unwilling to address the Marks affair straight on. The editorial charges Lilley with having “laryngitis” and being dismissive of the press.
- September 19, 2007: “ID Debate to Continue in New Film” — Baylor student paper reports on EXPELLED crew coming to campus the following day.
- September 18, 2007: “BU Administration Silencing Science by Design” — Walt Ruloff, the executive producer of EXPELLED, here writes a hard-hitting editorial that appears in the Baylor student newspaper. In the editorial he indicates that he is sending a crew to Baylor to interview President Lilley September 20th.
- September 17, 2007: “The Unpardonable Sin in Academia” — Regis Nicoll weighs in on this scandal.
- September 14, 2007: “Baylor Closes Ranks, Defends Darwin Against All Lines of Evidence” — Denyse O’Leary summarizes the present impasse.
- September 14, 2007: “BU Opens Old Wounds with Marks” — Editorial in the Baylor student newspaper (The Lariat) defending Robert Marks’s academic freedom.
- September 13, 2007: “Let Academic Freedom Ring” — Letter to Baylor student newspaper from Cody Cobb, atheist biochemistry major at Baylor, who defends Robert Marks’s academic freedom to post his ID-related work on the Baylor server.
- September 11, 2007: “So where ARE the Friends of Robert Marks? Of intellectual freedom at Baylor?” — Denyse O’Leary here takes apart the claim by the Baylor PR people that the Evolutionary Informatics Lab was not doing “approved research.”
- September 11, 2007: “New Intelligent Design Conflict Hits BU” — The Baylor Lariat, the student newspaper, finally weighs in on Baylor’s academic discrimination crisis over Robert Marks’s Evolutionary Informatics Lab. This story presents Baylor’s latest subterfuge in trying to justify its removal of the lab — that it does not do “approved research.” Go here for additional comment.
- September 10, 2007: “Baylor Forces Professor to Shut Down Site” — The Syracuse University student newspaper beats out the Baylor student newspaper (the Lariat) in reporting on this story.
- September 10, 2007: “Baylor’s Post Hoc Rationalizations” — Dean Kelley’s email to Prof. Marks, given here, requiring him to remove the EIL website from his space on the Baylor server gives the lie to all post hoc rationalizations by Baylor about the lab’s removal.
- September 9, 2007: “Baylor University Accused of Viewpoint Discrimination In Suppression of Pro-Intelligent Design Scientist” — Discovery Institute rightly continues to hammer the point that the crisis at Baylor over Prof. Robert Marks’s Evolutionary Informatics Lab is not over some procedural mix up but is squarely a case of the Baylor administration singling out him and his lab for prejudicial treatment.
- September 9, 2007: “Web Site Sparks New Intelligent Design Battle at Baylor University” — The Waco Tribune-Herald, the local paper where Baylor is located, here weighs in on the controversy. The coverage is not bad, but it leaves open whether Baylor might just be following a school policy in removing the EIL site. Note my comments added to the online version of the article, which indicate that the problem was indeed the lab’s connection to ID and guilt by association.
- September 8, 2007: “Of Groups and Labs at Baylor” — If there was any doubt that the Baylor administration was treating Prof. Marks unfairly by removing his lab from Baylor and the Baylor server, there is no longer. Baylor has unfairly singled out him and his lab.
- September 8, 2007: “THE GREAT ESCAPE: A Tribute to Bob Marks” — How intolerance at Baylor to the EILab reflects a much bigger conflict between the forces of oppression and of liberation.
- September 7, 2007: “Baylor University Attacks Scientists for Questioning Evolution (PODCAST)” — Casey Luskin and Rob Crowther of Discovery Institute’s Center for Science and Culture discuss the history of intolerance at Baylor toward ID proponents. In an earlier podcast (Well-Informed: Dr. Robert Marks and the Evolutionary Informatics Lab, July 20, 2007), Casey Luskin interviewed Prof. Robert Marks regarding the Evolutionary Informatics Lab while its website was still on the Baylor server. That interview led Benjamin Kelley, dean of engineering at Baylor, to ban the EIL website from Prof. Marks’s space on the Baylor server.
- September 7, 2007: “Not so fast: Baylor’s treatment of an ID-advancing research lab has shifted from friendly to fire” — WORLD Magazine, which first reported on the recent troubles at Baylor (go here) and, at the time, painted a rosy picture of a coming resolution, here updates its earlier report, indicating that the Baylor administration is digging in its heels against Robert Marks’s Evolutionary Informatics Lab.
- September 6, 2007: “Baylor University Denies Research Scientist’s Academic Freedom” — Discovery Institute press release about the latest Baylor fiasco. This will help take the story to the mainstream media nationally.
- September 6, 2007: “Baylor’s Main Argument Against the Evo-Info Lab — Reply to Lori Fogleman” — Baylor is saying that the problem with Robert Marks putting his Evolutionary Informatics Lab on the Baylor server was procedural, violating Baylor policy about the appropriate use of its “brand name.” This line of argument is here shown to fail. Marks’s lab was removed because of guilt by association with intelligent design.
- September 5, 2007: “I.D. rift hits Baylor again” — The Baptist Press reports on the Evo-Info Lab controversy, thus drawing the attention of Southern Baptists nationwide (Baylor is a Southern Baptist institution).
- September 5, 2007: “Academic Freedom Expelled from Baylor University” — The widely read Evolution News & Views blog reports on the controversy.
- September 4, 2007: “Baylor Episode Is Getting Wider Circulation” — Atheist biologist and blogger P. Z. Myers, per impossibile, takes the side Robert Marks against the Baylor administration.
- September 4, 2007: “Baylor U. Removes a Web Page Associated With Intelligent Design From Its Site” — Chronicle of Higher Education reports on the lab, taking the controversy national.
- September 3, 2007: “Backgrounder to Robert Marks’s lab shutdown: Baylor revokes Dembski’s research fellowship 2006” — Denyse O’Leary provides background indicating that Baylor’s suppression of the Evolutionary Informatics Lab is consistent with past actions by President John Lilley to suppress ID at Baylor.
- September 1, 2007: “Baptist University pulls plug on Evolutionary Informatics Lab – links to intelligent design fatal” — Denyse O’Leary breaks the story here at UD that the crisis is far from resolved.
- August 17, 2007: “Crisis Averted: Baylor Avoids Anti-ID Purge from Years Before” — WORLD Magazine reports on an August 9th meeting at Baylor indicating that the crisis over the Evolutionary Informatics Lab has been resolved equitably to the satisfaction of all parties. Unfortunately, the article did not anticipate President John Lilley overturning the agreements reached at that meeting.
57 Responses to Evolutionary Informatics Media Coverage: Baylor, Robert Marks, and the EvoInfo Lab
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Wonder if Pres. Lilley will be taking any phone calls this morning? LOL, Seeing as how he avoided the meeting taking the site down in the first place, I don’t think he is the type to handle the growing controversy all that well. Maybe some good will come of it and he will finally come out of hiding and give ID a fair hearing, personally, from Dr. Marks, instead of listening to the lies of the spin-meisters and cheerleaders of the Neo-Darwinian orthodoxy.
Don’t you love it when someone says, “I wasn’t spinning?†Seems to me a real semiotic 007 would be a little more clever.
The tactic for institutional Darwinism is clear: impugn the integrity of the doubters. So it is with all totalitarian enthusiasms. As Solzenitzen showed, anyone who questions Marxism in an avowedly Marxist state must be insane. This is because totalitarianism cannot tolerate dissent, which detracts from its ideological purity.
IDers resist the Darwinist empire, and therefore they must be insaneâ€â€or “wicked,†as the grand inquisitor would have it. See how wicked they are! They think Things That Must Not Be Thought! They advocate academic freedom! They expect to be paid for doing research! For heaven’s sake, they talk about God!
Such wickedness must be suppressed, and it seems a secret agent is just the man to do it. Infiltrate and blow up the facility. Isn’t that how all such heroic tales end?
If I didn’t know that God is in charge I might despair.
There seems to be a cognitive dissonance on the part of Baylor’s administrators ( and I am being kind here ).
I note that after Prof. Marks meeting with the administrators ( which ended amicably by what I read ), the meeting in fact ended in PRAYER. That’s right *PRAYER*.
Now here’s the question to ask — are they praying to God ? if so, then God, by definition is the creator of the universe. And if he is the creator, He necessarilly is the intelligent designer.
Yet, here we are — an administration that prays to the designer while simulataneously preventing any research that tries to discover the designer’s handiwork.
This is a case of cognitive dissonance. It would be more honest if we had a school that simply says — we don’t believe in intelligent design or any God who created the universe.
Here, we have a school whose administrators profess to believe in the designer while at the same time frowning on any research trying to understand the designer’s creation.
Perhaps Baylor shut down the lab because the research was too devastating to Darwinism. I noticed that the research papers had been submitted to peer review a while ago. When the reviewers discovered how threatening the findings are to the status quo they could have pressured Baylor to terminate the lab. They may be hoping that with the lab closure the research will end and they will not have to deal with Mark’s critciques. This may be just another manifestation of the difficulties, like the ones Behe is enduring, getting good ID science published.
Peter: I think you are being a bit too conspiratorial. This is mainly about Baylor’s public perception and Baylor’s ability to attract funding — they see any too visible ID initiative as making them look bad. Given how ID is perceived in academic culture, they may be right. But it still doesn’t justify their gross violation of academic freedom.
RE:
Peter:
—————–
I noticed that the research papers had been submitted to peer review a while ago.
—————–
I might have missed this. Please enlighten me and others as to which paper(s) was/were submitted for peer review and in which journal.
We’ also be interested in the results (if any) of the peer review ( e.g. comments from the reviewers ).
Thanks much.
Prof Dembski: I’ll admit I am wrong when I learn that his papers have been published. But I was expecting the shoe to drop in some fashion, and it has. Disproving evolution would upset a large, prestigious, academic enterprise. I wouldn’t be surprised if Mark’s papers were discussed as high up as the NAS. Who else could pressure the president of Baylor to act against everything that Baylor stands for?
My understanding is that this issue is not about ID research in Baylor but about research that *might* have positive results for arguments made by ID-proponents. To my knowledge evolutionary algorithms/programming is still considered a valid research subject even among Darwinists? The questions I would ask Baylor administration are as follows: Are evolutionary programs and algorithms still valid research subjects in academia? Surely the publications done will flourish or perish on their own merit no matter who has done them?
Sent my email in!
Everyone get in on the bandwagon!
I sent my letters as well.
This kind of invite to write to relevant people about an issue seems to me like a good thing to do shortly after expelled comes out as well. I have a feeling that lots of letters will be sent at that time.
This is my first comment.
Yes, it may be good to point out to regents that Baylor’s treatment of Prof. Marks will be featuring in EXPELLED (www.expelledthemovie.com).
There is a mistake on the Regent list I think; it seems that Dr. Stone’s email address is attributed to Dr. Turner.
Any progress on the missing addresses? I’ve sent an email to all the existing ones.
Look at the new UD post titled “Baylor Board of Regents.”
If removal from the Baylor website shows university disapproval, then being allowed to remain on the Baylor website implies university approval. Is this implication of university approval a message that Baylor wants to convey?
Also, if Baylor thinks that the name “Evolutionary Informatics Lab” sounds hokey, what about the name “Station for Experimental Evolution”?
– from http://www.amphilsoc.org/library/mole/e/ero.htm
William Dembski said,
Yes — the IEEE Transactions series includes the following subjects:
Evolutionary Computation
Computational Biology and Bioinformatics
– from http://www.ieee.org/web/public.....index.html
Also, the headline of the home webpage of the IEEE Computational Intelligence Society says, “mimicking nature for problem solving.” See http://ieee-cis.org/
Baylor’s unscholarly and anti-intellectual action appears to be an attack on the legitimacy of these IEEE activities. Why hasn’t IEEE weighed in on this controversy?
If removal from the Baylor website shows university disapproval, then being allowed to remain on the Baylor website implies university approval.
Larry, that’s a very good point. Does the university really want to implicitly endorse every webpage a member of the faculty might put on its site?
Apparently yes.
[...] According to today’s Baylor Lariat (the student newspaper), the producer of the upcoming Ben Stein documentary on suppression of ID (www.expelledthemovie.com) is sending a crew to Baylor to interview President John Lilley and others regarding the removal of Robert Marks’s Evolutionary Informatics Lab from Baylor (for the background on this story, go here). These icons link to social bookmarking sites where readers can share and discover new web pages. [...]
[...] is not due out until February 2008, and for that matter it doesn’t even seem to be done filming yet, but it is sure causing a lot of stir. Starring Ben Stein, the movie is a documentary [...]
I’m a little dismayed that there hasn’t been more national coverage of Baylor’s disgraceful behavior. Most of the citations above are from the Baylor student newspaper, Discovery Institute press releases, and the local Waco newspaper. This is really disheartening.
I would think that someone like Bill O’Reilly or Sean Hannity would be interested in covering this. Has any effort been made to contact them?
[...] has Started. The “Expelled” film crew visit to Baylor seems to have kicked off a second “media wave” about the Robert Marks-Evolutionary Informatics Lab issue. Besides the two stories mentioned in my [...]
Good point Larry. I expect this will happen soon enough.
You will probably get around to posting this anyway, but I thought I would mention that over at Evolution News & Views they mention a new Op-Ed in the Waco-Trib that is highly critical of Baylor on this issue.
[...] I’m afraid in my recent efforts to throw light on the Baylor administration’s removal of Robert Marks’s Evolutionary Informatics Lab from Baylor, I succumbed to the “low polemic” that my English colleague feared. I have no regrets about alerting my contacts in the press about Baylor’s suppression of academic freedom in the Marks affair. [...]
[...] Tribune expressing astonishment at the sheer, manifest vulgarity of the attempt to suppress the Evolutionary Informatics Lab: As counsel for Baylor Distinguished Professor Robert J. Marks II, I was amazed and discouraged by [...]
[...] in the upcoming Ben Stein documentary (www.expelledthemovie.com), go to my blog Uncommon Descent (http://www.uncommondescent.com.....-evoluti...). Mind you, Robert Marks’s title is Distinguished Professor of Electrical and Computer [...]
[...] [...]
[...] recall, expelled Robert Marks’s Evolutionary Informatics Lab from Baylor (for that story, go here). July 24, 2008 9:57AM President of Baylor University Fired John Lilley had angered alumni, [...]