- H. L. Mencken, writing of William Jennings Bryan, counsel for the supporters
of Tennessee's anti-evolution law at the Scopes "Monkey Trial" in 1925.
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-...we must counterpose the overwhelming judgment provided by consistent
-observations and inferences by the thousands. The earth is billions of
-years old and its living creatures are linked by ties of evolutionary
-descent. Scientists stand accused of promoting dogma by so stating, but
-do we brand people illiberal when they proclaim that the earth is neither
-flat nor at the center of the universe? Science *has* taught us some
-things with confidence! Evolution on an ancient earth is as well
-established as our planet's shape and position. Our continuing struggle
-to understand how evolution happens (the "theory of evolution") does not
-cast our documentation of its occurrence -- the "fact of evolution" --
-into doubt.
-- Stephen Jay Gould, "The Verdict on Creationism", The Skeptical Inquirer,
- Vol XII No. 2
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This was the ultimate form of ostentation among technology freaks -- to have
a system so complete and sophisticated that nothing showed; no machines,
no wires, no controls.