oh those rude, snarky accommodationists…
If you remember Massimo Pigliucci and his vague. politically driven case for accommodationism as well as his snarl at PZ Myers and other scientists and skeptics in defense of his friend’s ridiculous attempt at legal pontification, you’re probably well aware that Pigliucci is all about tone. According to him, vocal atheists are a loud and obnoxious crowd that makes the faithful mad without accomplishing anything of note. Not unlike him and his polite, calm, and politically savvy friends who know what to say and how to say it properly, so to really spread sound scientific facts and counter religious fundamentalism, we should stick with him and his fellow accommodationists. Or at least, this seems to be his implied thesis. And surely, someone so concerned with matters of tone and civility to the faithful would never be accused of writing something religious writers would ridicule as rude, sarcastic and disrespectful to “all those who hold different views,” right? Actually, he would.
As a matter of fact, Pigliucci’s new book Nonsense on Stilts, which focuses on how to separate science from pseudoscientific bunk and media hype, has been ridiculed at The Chronicle of Higher Education as nothing more than rude polemics. Funny how that happens, huh? You suddenly come down from wafting in the cloud of good intentions and amicability to take a stance, holding claims about the universe to proper scrutiny and skeptical investigation, and you’ve suddenly incensed some wannabe theologian who reviews your work with ridiculous platitudes and pseudoscientific, faith-affirming self-indulgences. Welcome to the world of those evil skeptics and atheists who have no regard for proper tone Dr. Pigliucci. Come on in, pull up a chair next to PZ, Jerry Coyne and whoever else you’ve been ridiculing over their tone so you can point to your book and explain just how well your brand of civility works to soothe those who are offended by the very notion of someone who has the audacity to challenge his claims and personal beliefs. And to my dear accommodationists who might be reading this post, I’d just like to point out that I told you how things like this happen and why.
For his part, Pigliucci didn’t provide any comments on the review on his blog, so I’m not sure whether he’s just pulling his punches, doesn’t care about the reviewer’s ridicule over his tone and advocacy for good science, or just isn’t aware of the review, which I find rather unlikely. If we’re dealing with the first scenario, then Pigliucci’s wags of the finger to those who critique accommodationists’ misguided advocacy of golden mean fallacies, or stern warnings about proper tone with the faithful sound rather hollow. When he stops being a philosopher for a little while and writes a book about the need of proper peer-review and good science reporting, he seems to disregard his own advice and just say what he really thinks. And if he doesn’t care about offending the delicate reviewers who are shocked, shocked I tell you, that he would dare compare intelligent design with and without the capitalization to the mock religion of Pastafarianism, then his support for accommodationism is a serious case of “do what I say, not what I do” and serves only as another example of how the notion of fusing science and religion against the objections of most scientists and most faithful, falls short.
