Tuesday, January 22, 2013

#385: Charles Thaxton


Charles B. Thaxton is a chemist, signatory to A Scientific Dissent From Darwinism, and, in short, another intelligent design author and Fellow of the Discovery Institute's Center for Science and Culture. He has a doctorate in physical chemistry from Iowa State, and has co-authored several books, including “The Mystery of Life's Origin” (with Walter L. Bradley and Roger L. Olsen), which employs (in effect) the second-law-of-thermodynamics gambit in favor of creationism, and “The Soul of Science” (with Nancy Pearcey).

He is most famous, however, for being co-editor (with Percival Davis and Dean Kenyon) of the first edition of “Of Pandas and People”, the creationist book (book review here) that spurred the Kitzmiller vs. Dover trial. During the trial Thaxton explained that he “wasn’t comfortable with the typical vocabulary that for the most part creationists were using because it didn’t express what I was trying to do. They were wanting to bring God into the discussion, and I was wanting to stay within the empirical domain and do what you can do legitimately there.” Translation: “I didn’t like the formulations, but the content was fine, and I would have preferred to conceal the blatantly religious agenda somewhat better.” His contributions are discussed here.

Together with his wife Carole he runs the “KONOS Connection”, an educational Christian organization in Fayetteville, GA.

Diagnosis: Yet another clueless science denialist (who rejects facts when they don’t conform to dogma), and one who has actually caused some harm. One to scare your kids with.

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