A mistake in shorthand?

New York Times reporter Elisabeth Bumiller now thinks that her error in substituting “biblical” for “biological” (when reporting the comments of an ID theorist) was caused by a mistake in reading her own shorthand under deadline pressure.

Fair enough; that can certainly happen, but it also suggests a lack of familiarity with the issues. Bumiller went into the interview expecting to hear that Meyer was trying to ram the Bible into public schools and had not picked up on what he was actually saying, that much biological evidence casts doubt on Darwin’s theory, but it can’t be presented. Meyer should know some of the reasons, based on his own experience. In my view, the Times needs to give its reporters more time to familiarise themselves with the issues. That way, when the Times wants to distort the issues, it can do a professional quality job.

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.

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- the California Academy of Sciences agreeing to correct potentially libellous statements about attorney Larry Caldwell, who thinks that students should know about weaknesses as well as strengths of Darwinian evolution theory, click on the posted link and check the current daily post for any updates. UPDATED!: The retraction and Caldwell’s response have now been published in California Wild.

- The op-ed by Catholic Cardinal Schonborn in the New York Times? Note also the Times's story on the subject, some interesting quotes from major Darwinists to compare with the Catholic Church's view, as expressed by the Cardinal, and an example of the kind of problem with Darwinian philosophy that the Cardinal is talking about.

- the Privileged Planet film shown at the Smithsonian, go here for an extended review. Please do not raise cain about an "anti-evolution" film without seeing it. If your doctor forbids you to see the film, in case you get too excited, at least read my detailed log of the actual subjects of the film. If you were one of the people who raised cain, ask yourself why you should continue to believe the people who so misled you about the film's actual content ...

- the showing of Privileged Planet at the Smithsonian, go here and here to start, and then this one and this one will bring you up to date.

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The spin cycle: New York Times changes “biological” to “biblical”

As reported over at Evolution News & Views, a Discovery Institute blog,
a New York Times story, "Bush Remarks Roil Debate Over Teaching of Evolution",
" mangled a quote from Steve Meyer, who said,

We interpret this as the president using his bully pulpit to support freedom of inquiry and free speech about the issue of biological origins.

and was reported as saying,

We interpret this as the president using his bully pulpit to support freedom of inquiry and free speech about the issue of biblical origins.

The Times has indicated that it would post a correction, but the site is rejecting my password so I can't get into it to find out just now. I'll update this when I can.

Some have asked whether these errors are accidental. Well, yes and no.

Every newspaper is governed by a mind set, and there are certain stories that it "wants." Liberal papers want different stories from conservative papers and religious papers want different stories from secular ones.

In any event, journalists know when they are writing a story the editor really wants - and when they aren't. I've written plenty of both types, and have sometimes been dumped for writing the second kind when no facts I reported were disputed. So it is quite possible that Bumiller thought that she heard "Biblical" for "biological." Her bosses' voices are ever humming in her ears, and she knows that they desperately want Meyer to have said "biblical".

We can guess as much from the headline of the news article itself: "Bush Remarks Roil Debate Over Teaching of Evolution." The assumption is that Bush is only causing trouble by expressing the view that students should hear both sides and learn to think for themselves.

It tells you everything you need to know about the Times and the Darwinists that Bush's opinion would be controversial. Like most good card players, Bush allows people to snooker themselves.

Incidentally, Meyer is the author of the paper discussing the Cambrian explosion in the Proceedings of the Biological Society of Washington that caused the Darwin lobby to launch a persecution of both author Meyer and editor Sternberg.

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