Darn Flip Floppers

[X_republican]

This is a letter that appeared in the Kansas City Star last Wednesday. Because you would have to sign up for the service and it's relatively short, I present it in its entirety.

(snip)

Darn flip-floppers

Where's the outrage over Stephen Hawking's blatant flip-flopping on the issue of black holes (7/22, A-9, “Physicist plugs the holes in his black hole concept”)?

For 29 years he claimed that they don't emit information; now all of a sudden they do. Which one is it, Professor Hawking?

Hawking claims that he thought about this question and realized that he had been mistaken in his previous assumptions.

I think most people will agree that we need scientists who are resolute, who stay the course no matter what the so-called “evidence” suggests.

(snip)

Too bad the sarcasm is more than likely lost on those it was aimed at.

[ContraBass Black]

1. People tell me that this kind of thing is subtle.

It looks rather obvious to me.

[Crunchy Frog]

2. Most RWers seem to

hate, fear, and fundamentally misunderstand science. My guess is that this would be completely lost on them.

Also, our educational system over the past couple of decades has done a phenomenal job in helping to create one of the most scientifically illiterate societies on earth.

I actually listened to an NPR reporter interviewing someone on this Hawking business recently. She was absolutely clueless, simply fixating on "Hawking was wrong? How could Hawking have screwed up so badly?" A fundamental misunderstanding of the basis on which science operates.:argh: