Okay, I Was Wrong - I Think Dr. Luskin Is Just Lying 

Someone? From the DI? LYING?? This is my shocked Pikachu face.

Well, Luskin does have a long history of lying, so it's hardly surprising when he lies.

You cannot make a man change his mind when his livelihood depends on not changing it.

Maybe now they will get Gunter to attack you like Prof Dave and Erica.

I don't always reject entire scientific disciplines on the word of a few kooks, but when I do, I look for kooks represented by a guy with no training in the field!

Creationist, honest, or well-informed: choose 2.

They're all lying by default simply by presenting themselves as experts. For the amount of study it takes to be a real expert, they have no excuse to misunderstand difficult things, let alone simple things

I immediately assume they had to be lying and not ignorant since all these refutations had been pointed out repeatedly over decades and the creationist points are still used, regardless.

He's not lying, he's saving souls with alternative facts.

It's one thing to not understand something or to make a mistake in your understand, but when you resort to lying, you've destroyed any credibility you may have had. I agree - I don't see any way out of the conclusion that he's just lying now.

On the ERV's and psychiatric 'diseases': those psychiatric diseases seem to be common in prophets, hearing voices and such, so in fact the 'disease' state can be viewed as functional, at least when present in individuals who also have genes that make them charismatic.

I think I know who will be featured in the next 'Creationists Behaving Badly' video.

If the pattern holds true, if enough of a stink is made about this, we should expect some kind of response in about a month or so. It won't really address the problem. There will probably be a bit of motte and baileying going on at some points. But it will be obvious to those on the outside that whatever their approach, DI's response will be solely directed at their audience. Geared more towards assuaging doubt rather than correcting errors. i.e. It will be a non-response. If they weren't lying, I'm not sure why they'd have a playbook for how to respond to these upsets which they roll out every time this happens.

I understand the desire to see the best in people. I try to do it as often as I can and assume a good faith misunderstanding when they just seem to consistently fail to engage with or mischaracterize an argument I’ve made, especially when it’s scientific. I know I use jargon, I know I’m not always clear. But when you are as clear as you have been, when your words are as clearly understood by other non-scientists as yours have been, you have to wonder if the problem is with him.

I can't wait for the next chapter in this ongoing saga!

Next step: you need to shed that mistaken respect for Casey Luskin. He doesn't deserve it.

Wow. Everyone I have heard from DI is a liar. Every time anyone of them says anything I have heard it is a lie. Rumours say that there is one secretary and one janitor at Discover Institute that aren't liars.

Grifters gotta grift 🤷‍♂️ I do like how kind hearted you are to give him the benefit of the doubt

You can only be two of those three things: 1. A creationist 2. Honest. 3. Knowledgeable.

It's good to be able to admit when you're wrong, but also we can recognize that you were wrong for good reasons. I'm also very reluctant to assume malice when incompetence is sufficient, but with some of these excusegists you just have to call it like you see it.

After McToon's "Gotta lie to flerf" I think we at this point really need to also say "Gotta lie to intelligent design" Add-on after watching the rest of the video, especially regarding the last two points. It seems that "something does anything, no matter what it is and under which circumstances" implies functional in his eyes.

Of course he lies. Do you remember the Dave Farina video on Casey Luskin? They manipulated a Nova film clip to claim Owen Lovejoy faked a fossil in order to give "Lucy" the status of a human ancestor.

As a longtime reader of Pharyngula, I will always just assume Luskin is lying. I always assumed he was incompetent 20 years ago.

Mr Farina! Here, Go, Go, Go, Go, Go, Go! You don't do it! Show me the chemistry! Come to the board and write!

I will say, it was much better in the longrun to give him the benefit of the doubt, because we would all eventually learn he's dishonest, and it led to you dismantling all of his points anyway. For anyone unconvinced of a side, this is a much better saga, with plenty of evidence for why you shouldn't take DI arguments seriously.

Knowing that ANY concession would jeopardize Luskin’s income, I concluded that he was lying from day 1.

It's a good rule to assume ignorance/stupidity rather than malfeasance when it's a possibility until proven otherwise.

Discovery Institute: Bad Arguments made disingenuously, for Jesus. Or someone like him. The end.

Wait. Wait wait wait wait wait. Dr Luskin is a geologist???? I know creationists operating outside their field is the norm but usually it's somewhat tangential. This is....hooboy.

You gave him the benefit of the doubt and he decided to remove all doubts.

Just a quick public service announcement: We have a vaccine for HPV, that is currently approved for people up to age 45 in the US. Get vaccinated, get your kids vaccinated.

When you read the "Creationist Bible", you will find that the "9th Commandment" has been scratched out.

"You really think people would do that? Just go on the internet and tell lies?"

Yes, you’re right. Don’t let it consume you too much. Yes, it’s frustrating when they seem to repeatedly “misunderstand” points, or like here, say things that they should already reasonably know are wrong. And as a scientist excited about your own subject, it’s natural to want to show them what’s right and why. It’s a spiral which can get out of control, so make sure you remember to keep it in perspective and look after yourself.

Creationists and ID'ers are dishonest, what's new

Thank you for admitting I have been right for a long time!

His geology work since he became a YEC is also very shallow and appears to ignore a lot of things that aren’t known by the general public but which any first year geology student has seen modelled many times and in different ways

The combo of a video cutting him a lot of slack, and then one revisiting things he's said publicly afterward showing he really is just lying, is probably more effective at changing minds. Especially since the algorithm will now probably try to get viewers to watch both, doubling their exposure to evidence of (1) dishonest intent and (2) the actual science. Also, I love that you Columbo'd him in an email.😊

Changing meanings or using multiple definitions interchangeably are common amongst Apologists.

Just a heads up, but the RU-vid channel "Smarter Every Day" just did an episode about the flagellum motor and used "irreducible complexity" and creationist arguments at the end of the video. That should be the end of that's channel's popularity with anyone that respects science. Don't give him the clicks or the subscription.

Do you think KC Luskin is well informed? Otherwise he's at only one point on the creationist triangle

I understand your hesitation at accusing someone of being a liar( even an employee of the Discovery Institute) because inherently honest people such as yourself struggle to do so. But I've been following the DI for about a decade now, and its undeniable that their default is dishonest misrepresentation to further their propaganda.

An apologist is a person that must adhere to a specific conclusion, observation and reason be damned. Lying for jesus is still lying.

When he was at Harvard at dinner with REAL professional colleagues, he looked like a fool. They had no respect for him. Hes a fool and he knows what hes doing. He gets his bread and butter from the discovery institute.

Kudos for figuring this out and admitting to getting it wrong originally. I too try to assume ignorance before malice, but I've become rather good at assessing malice as well (in my opinion), and I believe this is a skill everyone should strive to achieve.

I think it's the right thing to do: A) To start with giving other people the benefit of the doubt. B) And then to call people out on lying when all generosity has been used up and there is no other conclusion that can be reached. Despite the sad ending, this was a fun and educational set of responses. It does you credit. I'm looking forward to the next one, whatever it ends up being--assuming any of the creationists are brave enough to take you on!!!

I’ve been following Luskin for the best part of two decades, and he’s always struck me as being somewhat economical with the truth. I thought that undertaking his PhD may have inculcated a measure of intellectual honesty but that appears not to be the case.

What? An apologist lying? I'm shocked, I tell you, SHOCKED! Well not that shocked...

There isn't a single honest or intelligent creationist.

Respect for giving him the benefit of doubt for this long

Dr. Dan @13:40 you were talking about an ERV which is now used by us (and other mammals?) by the placenta. So the function of that ERV has been changed. So my question is how was that change accomplished, was that via one of these virtually non-existent beneficial mutations? You know the ones that creationists what to deny happen?

A geologist talking about things outside of his expertise, while including 'Dr.' on his byline is already skirting the edge of dishonesty. And - of course - this material is not meant to be a scientific paper of any sort - the purpose is to give creationists otherwise ignorant of the science something to bring up in conversation with someone else equally as ignorant of the science. The ultimate goal being the apologetic defense of their particular mythos. Pretty much anyone defending young earth creationism using scientific results is either knowingly, or with complete disregard, using those results in a way that generally contradicts the actual findings - or at least is distorting the findings in a way to support their agenda. That is a fundamentally dishonest position to start from. They are not arguing in good faith, and we should stop pretending they are.

Luskin is just like Meyer. Skillful at taking an inch of truth and stretching it a mile.

Well-informed, honest, creationist. You can only pick two.

Enhancer regions are actually really tricky to identify. It's mortally hard to identify regions to which transcription factors will bind. I've tried!

This isn't the first time I've seen this sort of thing happen with Case Luskin.

I'd like to see them apply this 'all the genome is functional' for organisms with whole genome duplications. (I would use the example of the strawberry, but I don't know if that duplication happened in cultivated or wild plants)

18:00 Wow id love to learn about the way the epigenome evolves to suppress these harmful coding ERV regions. Fascinating.

It honours you being so generous, but they live from lying to their flock. If they stop lying, they go broke

It's disappointing when a discussion arrives to the point where you realize your interlocutor is deliberately being dishonest or at least intellectually dishonest. Especially during professional interactions, the last thing I want to do is think the worst of someone. It's commendable that you gave Luskin the benefit of the doubt until direct evidence sufficiently demonstrated otherwise. Were I you, I wouldn't have done anything differently as long as there's no risk of harm to me or anyone else. Regarding risk, as much as I like to think the best of people, I don't put myself in a position to be taken advantage of. Hurting my feelings is an acceptable risk -- moving on from the offender is easy -- anything more, however, is not. Considerable harm to anyone's mental health is likewise unacceptable.

8:41 This step has a non-sequitur, which isn't necessary for the whole argument to still be an argument to raise doubts against "mainstream science". So if you steelman the argument, what you would conclude isn't that *all* DNA has a function, but instead, that scientists have been going overboard with calling things junk, because according to premise 1., they said that all non-coding DNA is junk, even though according to premise 2., some non-coding DNA should not be called junk. This conclusion really does follow from the premises of the argument, and it does this so naturally that someone doesn't even need to make it explicit, as long as they get an audience to accept the premises 1 and 2. What's important is that this argument is a steelman of the argument that you described, but still is equally debunked by recognizing that premise 1. is a misrepresentation and should not be granted. So in the future, I think it would make sense to just address this one instead.

How dare you, sir. A creationist lying? That almost always happens! We will most certainly stand for your coming to this conclusion! Take my like!

Thankyou so much for explaining this to me like I’m 12. I was getting lost in this back and forth and it seemed like Luskin was agreeing with you and so didn’t notice the bait switch.

It's amazing that you thought that he misunderstood something. Their income depends on intentionally not misunderstanding and misrepresenting everything i.e. lying.

Ask Inspiring Philosophy: WHO made the Moabite Stone ❓ Without lies, religion dies.

So you were overdue in instituting this discovery? Deciding sooner FTD! (For The darWin.)

@Dan: If I understood Luskin correctly, he does not say that the expression of ERVs is responsible for psychiatric disorders. Rather he notes that any *change* of the *normal* expression level can cause psychiatric disorders.

That "simple argument" is fallacious on its face, irrelevant of any misrepresentation of history.

Discovery Institute articles are most likely generated and/or vetted by a committee. Whose job is to maintain their Intelligent Design Universe official canon. Their only interest is to maintain the internal consistency of their model and will ignore, and lie about anything that threatens this. They have internal subject "experts" that the rest of them have to bow down to, if they want to keep their jobs.

20:00 can you explain to me how this doesn’t shatter the evidential utility of the statistical argument for ERV placements within the Chimpanzee / human genome supporting evolution? In my debates with creationists I was forced to dig up data showing that while there are hot spots in the genetic code. Each ERV could have embedded in one of many insertions sites. So the fact that the same ERVs occur in the same sites was best explained by a single infection event in a common ancestor. But right now you seem to be saying that HPV consistently binds to a single site stimulating the nearby region that leads to cancer. Is that because HPV is not an ERV? Thanks.

I hope you realize now that you publically called them out, they do their toddler thing, cross their arms and go "no, now I dont want to talk to you anymore", right? Not that it hurts you to not have these liars for jesus on your channel anymore.

yep, his pants are so on fire

It’s fair enough to forgive people for not knowing stuff that’s outside of their field, BUT if it’s outside of his field, why is he writing articles and debating it? I appreciate you being charitable and assuming he was mistaken rather than dishonest, but even if that had been the case, people speaking on topics they don’t understand is also an issue; it’s the reason movements like antivax and flat earth have spread on social media.

… is he possibly claiming that functional=does anything including destructive things under at least one condition?

Isn't there a bible verse about lying?

Thanks Dr. Dan!

Creationists lying? Isn't that a requirement for being a creationist?

I don't understand what is meant by "functional" DNA - If HERVs aren't functional because they cause issues when they are expressing, how is that not function? I don't understand biology concepts very easily, and I'm stuck in colloquial territory for the word "functional", i.e., if it's doing something, it has a function. Obviously from what you're saying, the word functional in this context means something else.

Greetings, my dear. Could you make a response to Platinga’s argument in the future?

Every creationist who's done more than two debates, and is still a creationist, is actively lying and deliberately so.

Regarding the viral enhancer argument: My lay-idiot understanding of what was represented here is that in order for something to be 'enhanced', there needs to be a base function there to get enchanced. If there's no function, then there's nothing to enhance. That's how I understood it, and I'm only speaking from the top of the Dunning-Kruger skislope, of course. I don't even have a geologist's knowledge of biology, so I defer to your expertise and only offer this as a way to help smart people understand dumb ones like me. :)

The super religious people believe that the ends justify the means, so when he lies for his faith it's actually a good thing.

You think, that process lies outside your world view. Fits the Christian world view perfectly.

🎶 Don't gohhhhhh... changinnnnn 🎶 Just cuz ya skeez meeeee Ya neverrrrr... 🎵 Stuck to facts 🎵 Beforrrrr 🎵 🎶 🎶 EWww wwww ww ww ww 🎶 Don't imagine... 🎶 There's no religiunnn. Oh wait. 🎵 That's a different 🎵 Songgg! 🎵 🎶 🎶 Ooo ooo ooo ooo ooops!

Isn't there a different definition of functional here? Disfunction is also a kind of function, a bad one. So there must be a difference between the colloquial term of function (have a function) and the genetics term of having a positive function. No?

Great video, Dan!

As an English-speaking non-biologist, it seems to me that something that functions is functional. That is, it produces an effect. Whether the effect is positive or negative is a value judgment. (As a crass example, one might well consider as positive a change in one'e mortal enemy's DNA that gives them cancer.) By extension, non-functional DNA would be inert, neutral, and incapable of producing an effect. As soon as such DNA is shown to reliably produce an effect, positive or negative, we would know that it is fact functional, and producing that effect is how it functions. At least, that is how I interpret those words. So this might all come down to yet another instance in which a lay person is confused by specialized jargon that is homonymous with ordinary language

save yuorself a lot of time. Assume educated creationists are lying unless proven otherwise.

Dr. Casey might want to check his closet, all of his pants are burning white hot.

Creationists have to lie, its part of their religion.

Oh hoh, i clicked this one so fast

If this annoys you, wait until you see the creationist nonsense about epigenetics.

Not to be *that guy* but... I sorta called this one Oh hey look it's me! xD 2:34

*surprised pikachu*

I wonder how much one of my genes is worth?🤔 Who knows, it could be a lot!😕 Of course I'd sell em' by the dozen, and make it worth a gene smith's money, and get repeat business for having "The Better Gene"!😁

Unfortunately, unlike you, I assume bad intentions from Luskin and everyone associated with the DI. They are doing apologetics not science. You cannot be doing science if you have to sign a statement of faith. As you know science is about going wherever the evidence leads, not making shit up and misrepresenting the evidence.

I sure hope you aren't an ex Christian, because even I know they lie all the time. It's called "lying for God!"

This just goes to show that you should never be so naive to give ANYONE from D.I. the benefit of the doubt, don't you know their motto is Jesus Enim Mendacem (Lying for Jesus)

“Dr” Luskin?

Unless you LIE, Creationism DIES.