#1363: Pieder Beeli

During the day Pieder Beeli is Senior Scientist for Schafer Corp – he has a PhD in physics and a respectable research record – but when his shift ends he turns into … Pieder Beeli, who writes for the WND, no less, where he e.g. tries to explain how anti-gay hate groups “can enrich any neighborhood.” Indeed, wingnut Beeli is not content being a mere physicisit, but transcends boundaries between disciplines with ease – he is a signatory to the Discovery Institute petition A Scientific Dissent from Darwinism, for instance, and (for the WND again) has applied “forensic linguistics” (no, not what is usually termed “forensic linguistics”) to unmask Obama’s secret Muslim sympathies. According to Beeli “[o]ften we can tell the truth about what someone believes by performing an inferential or forensic analysis. We analyze what is implied rather than what is explicitly stated.” So what’s the evidence for Obama’s secret Muslim sympathies? Well, you can see for yourself here. Suffice to say, Beeli’s methodology suggests that you should be careful about trusting the results achieved in his published papers on physics as well.

As for evolution, Beeli complained during his student days that the neo-Darwinian “fish to man theory that is dogmatically taught” was taught at Notre Dame, complaining that there were no examples of beneficial mutations.

Diagnosis: Batshit wingnut, and proof that a PhD in physics does not entail any understanding of science or scientific methodology.