Not funding an anti-ID campaign means that a social science body is "infected with post-modern drivel"?

Dan Adelman at New Republic thinks that rejecting a grant for Brian Alters means that Canada's Social Sciences and Humanities Research council is infected with "post-modern drivel" . Ironically, the Council is actually trying to preserve social science standards in denying a grant to a man who is a combatant in the controversy, which means that - whatever his other merits - he is of little value as a researcher.

As I have said elsewhere, if the Council is forced by pressure to cave and give Alters the money, it won't be the biggest waste of funds or the first time such things have happened. Activist research has been the curse of social science in Canada for some time. People are given money all the time to go out and prove all kinds of propositions in which they obviously have a vested interest. It was nice to see the Council taking a stand, however briefly, against an egregious example.

Incidentally, Canadians will recall that the Canadian government has also eliminated the Court Challenges program, by which leftists were given money to challenge traditional values, but the upholders of traditional values had to raise cash from the meagre leftovers from steep taxation.

If you like this blog, check out my book on the intelligent design controversy, By Design or by Chance?. You can read excerpts as well.