Who is Michael Egnor?

Denialists of all types are fond of arguing from authority. That is, one of their favored rhetorical tactics is to compile lists of smart people who appear to support their position or who "doubt" the current scientific and historical consensus opinion. The most visible use of this tactic is by creationists and climate change skeptics.

This tactic has been so common among creationists for the last thirty years or so that it has reached the level of self-parody and spawned several running gags and parodies. One of the great running gags is the Salem Hypothesis, which states: "In any Evolution vs. Creation debate, a person who claims scientific credentials and sides with Creation will most likely have an Engineering degree." The National Center for Science Education's Project Steve is the classic parody. To counter the engineer heavy lists of doubters maintained by creationist groups like the Discovery Institute, the NCSE has assembled a list of just biologists named Steve who support evolution. The NCSE's list is bigger.

Faced with the fact that their over-dependence on engineers as smart-guy spokespersons has become a cliché and a joke, the Discover Institute has recently begun using medical doctors to write their op-ed pieces. All in all, this isn't a bad tactic. Most people have no trouble understand that a biologist outranks an engineer as an authority on biology. However, doctors have something to do with biology and many people have more respect for doctors than they do for academics, so, in the public mind, a doctor makes an excellent counterbalance to a professor Steve.

And this brings us to Michael Egnor, an evolution doubting surgeon and the Discover Institute's latest star. For the last few weeks, Dr. Egnor has been so active writing editorials and arguing with blogger that I honestly wonder if he still practices medicine. For a sample of the fireworks, browse through the last few weeks at The Panda's Thumb or ScienceBlogs.

Coturnix noticed that the Discovery Institute did a great job in choosing Dr. Egnor. Should a journalist come across him, wonder "Igor who?", and Google his name, they will find a lot about him as a surgeon and a lot written by creationists in his support. The rebuttals to his actual arguments are much less visible, and ScienceBlogs is treated as one blog rather than the sixty or so that it really is. To bump the rebuttals up the page a bit, Coturnix has organized this Google cluster bomb.

I'm glad to help.

Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor •Michael Egnor