#77: William B. Collier

William B. Collier is a professor of chemistry at Oral Roberts University, which is of course not an academic institution or research institution but a fundamentalist boot camp. Accordingly, Collier is not a scientist and does no serious research. He has, however, an education in science, which is qualification enough to be a signatory to Discovery Institute’s petition A Scientific Dissent of Darwinism. Collier’s acceptance of creationism appears to be based on the claim that religion and science is the same, and since they are the same they must be of equal epistemic merit. That is, it matters not that science is based on reality and evidence. It’s all about beliefs.
Diagnosis: Collier is a minor figure but is included as a rather typical representative of the quality found among many of the signatories to Discovery’s list – and to represent the ghastly pseudo-university that is the Oral Roberts institute.