Only a theory

Shakespeare's Sister bangs her head against the wall over Bush's endorsement of Intelligent Design.

(Head against wall banging trope swiped from Brad DeLong---his walls are full of holes and dents from the many folks he's caught driven to head against wall banging frustration by the Bush Leaguers' twin allergies to truth and reality.)

Sis can't stand it that there are so many people who think the word "theory" is a synonym for "crazy idea pulled out of thin air with absolutely no evidence to support it."  This is of course how people use the word in conversation.

"Hey, I have a theory that if the Mets trade Piazza to the Orioles for Sammy Sosa, they can go all the way!"

"Listen, my theory about that is, John Roberts is really a closet liberal and he's gonna suprise the hell out of everybody."

"You know my wife's theory, don't you?  She thinks Christopher's going to turn informer when he finds out Tony had Adrianna whacked and in the last espisode they'll shoot it out by the pool and Tony'll end up floating face down with those ducks bobbing about around him."

"My theory is she's just playing hard to get.  I'm gonna go over there!"

People also misuse the word hopefully, mix up imply and infer, and have no idea where to place the damn apostrophe in making a plural possessive.

(The Chicago Manual of Style deals with some of these mistakes on its web page.  Thanks to OGIC for the link.)

Right Wing Fundies pushing Intelligent Design are depending on people not knowing what the word theory means, same as they can't tell its from it's.

Somehow I never find myself in conversation with people who have trouble accepting that we live in a material world that functions according to strict physical laws, as opposed to someplace like Oz where physics, biology, and geology are replaced by magic.

My theory is---which is to say, my wild idea that I've just pulled out of thin air with no evidence to support it; I can be just as sloppy in my use of language as the next semi-literate---my theory is that my ability to repel religious nuts is related to my ability in huge crowds to attract total strangers looking for directions to someplace.

This is a fact.  It can even be called The Theory of Mannion's Appearance of Universal Competence and it has been tested and peer-reviewed.   Put me in a crowd anywhere, Boston, Singapore, Jakarta, Des Moines, and before I can get to the end of a block, eight people will have stopped me to ask for directions.

When I'm in stores I also get asked all the time if I work there, even when I'm standing next to a real employee wearing an orange vest or laminated ID on a lanyard.

Maybe what I've got here is the beginning of a hypothosis, a word we should be encouraging grade school teachers to drill into kids' heads before they get to junior high.

People needing directions look at me and think I just look like I know where I'm going, and people who believe that the world works because God has been doing conjuring tricks every second since the dawn of time, 10,000 years ago, look at me and think, Oh oh, rational human being, and don't bother talking to me.

But if one of them ever does make the mistake of thinking I'm interested or, as is increasingly more likely to happen, I ever find myself in an argument with one of them at a PTO meeting, and they pull their favorite rhetorical trick:

"Well, you know, evolution is only a theory."

I'll say, "You what what?  Gravity is only a theory too.  What do you say we test it?  Let's see you jump off a cliff."

PZ Myers is marginally more polite about this.  Marginally.

Comments

[Campaspe]

I think this conflation of "theory" with "guess" is, in fact, extremely useful. There are few errors in life that mark someone so plainly as an absolute head-in-a-bag idiot. It is as good as a secret handshake.

You have me thinking of a great Inspector Morse episode some time back, where a letter-writer mixed up "its" and "it's," prompting Morse to describe him as "illiterate" with a tone of contempt you'd expect to hear reserved for the murderer.

[denisdekat]

You captured it well Lance :) This adminstration is all about corruption of language and meaning (Orwellian to say the least). Remember the clear skies initiative? The one that reduced pollution greatly? It turns out they stopped counting tons of pollutants, that way they can crank up the poisons, etc...

Anyhow, getting back to the point here, they are now confusing simple folks on what a theory in scientific terms means. A short while back when there was talk about global warming, I heard on republican talking head (if only I could remember who that gold star sell out was) say something "how dare the scientists be so arrogant as to think they know better?" I was not sure whether to laugh or cry at that moment. Of course the corporate news reader did not challenge a ridiculous statement like that...

[mac macgillicuddy]

I feel compelled to mention, also, the abomination "its'" -- which appears only to be a word in college freshman English composition classes.

Anyway, I'd heard that the Prez came out endorsing "intelligent design," but I didn't actually read any of the reports beyond a headline because -- what the heck is the president of the United States, or of any political body for that matter, doing commenting on -- much less "endorsing" -- scientific or religious ideas? This really is taking the so-called Bully Pulpit too far.

As if we have all been waiting for our government to give us permission to believe in whatever we believe in.

[Exiled in NJ]

I decided to test Mannion's postulant, or was it a corollary, about gravity. I was to be the observer; the dog would take the flying leap, but she decided it was too hot, so I had to settle for Mrs. O'Bannon's pig. I put it in the back of the Outback, drove to the overhang, got it out, threw some chickenbacks into space and watched my porcine friend leap after them. You won't believe this, Lance, but to my amazement, the pig sprouted wings and proceeded to swoop down and grab my crab bait and flew off with it. I am sure pigs flying had something to do with Intelligent Design, but I can't get through to Mr. Rove to tell him. His line is always busy.

[The Viscount LaCarte]

The Viscountess wants a bumper sticker that says:

"Evolution is Theory.
Creation is MYTH!"

She says not "believeing" in evolution is like not believing in Calculus.

Lewis Black told me (and about 5000 other people in the audience) "I used to argue with Creationists. Not anymore. Wanna know why? BECAUSE THEY'RE IDIOTS."

All adds up doesn't it? Makes sense that Bush would endorse "Intelligent Design."

[carla]

It's not about being idiots...although that would wrap things up nicely and neatly. Most creationists aren't idiots. They're offended at the idea that they descended from apes. This would mean that God is an ape...as they believe God created man from his own image. They've spent their entire religious lives steeped in the idea that God is a kindly old beared Dumbledore in white robes who lives on clouds and gives out jeweled crowns to the good Christians.

The idea that God might look like Cornelius (or worse, Zera) from Planet of the Apes is a jagged little pill.

[mac macgillicuddy]

God looks like George Burns. Always has, always will.

[grishaxxx]

O, Mac, there really is an its' somewhere? - god, what a teratoma of a word! You're already giving me nightmares.
On theory, I was corrected only the other day by my brother, who knew I was using it colloquially, but who won a point, in our context, by preferring hypothesis. Those two extra syllables must overtax the Creationist/ID noggin, but perhaps they know that a hypothesis is commonly understood as requiring proof to move up in class. Ouch!
As for Lance's being singled out for directions to the Lost, Dazed or Confused - happens to me, too, for no apparent reason (I mean, drivers will stop and ask me, a walker) other than, perhaps, I look as if I know where I'm going. I don't always, really!

[J. Rosen]

Written a couple of years ago, but perhaps timely: (In the last line, feel free to substitute any name that fits the rythm, say "G. W. Bush".)

A molecule: given it self-replicates,
Add random mutation, it opens the gates
To wonders; selection, you see, with the time
Of a few billion years breeds a lion from slime.
Yet, pardon my doubt if that really is true
If Dennis Kozlowski’s the best it can do.