origin of life bliss

I guess I was asking for it. It was only a matter of time before the wacko creationists would contact me, as I am in graduate school in an origin of life lab:

Esteemed Academics (Evolutionary Biologists and Theistic Evolutionists),

I am pleased to announce the existence of "The Origin-of-Life Prize" ® to be awarded for proposing a highly plausible mechanism for the spontaneous rise of genetic instructions in nature sufficient to give rise to life. To win, the explanation must be consistent with empirical biochemical, kinetic, and thermodynamic concepts as further delineated herein, and be published in a well-respected, peer-reviewed science journal(s). www.us.net/life/

It is well known that the scientific community is greatly undercompensated for its heroic efforts to uphold objective unbiased truth in our society. This prize presents an opportunity to remunerate the virtuous efforts of scientists to promote awareness of the truth of Darwinist theories.

Also, to demonstrate the sincerity of my promise to the Detective Thomas W. Grimes of the UNCG police department not to harass you about Creationist ideas, I am submitting this information to you in the sincere hope that one or more of you will be able to vindicate your commitment to Darwinist idealogy and be concommitantly generously rewarded for your efforts to enhance the respectibility of this field of inquiry in the eyes of both the American scientific establishment and the taxpaying public at large.

May the most highly evolved man (or woman) win...

Sincerely,

Michael Korn

PS Here is some theological encouragement from Prof. Francisco Ayala, whose book, Darwin's Gift: to Science and Religion, suggests that the famous curse upon Adam and Eve in Genesis 3 is simply a metaphor to explain man's tragic awareness of his own mortality that results from his highly evolved brain attaining advanced lingusitic and other cognitive skills.

I have to say this email leaves me a little flattered. I haven't even published in the origin of life field yet, and this guy thinks I'm going to solve the whole thing! But I digress...

My swelled ego was dissolved (pun intended) by key words/phrases that demand attention: "Darwinist", "theistic evolutionist", "Darwinist idealogy [sic]", "highly evolved", "curse". All indications of a certified wacko. How could I not click his website (while my heathen experiments played themselves out on my lab bench).

A brief review of his Web 1.0 website demonstrates a painful non-understanding of biology and biological terminology.

But I thought I might read the "Judging" section. How could I resist such divinely-inspired word choice. First, submitted proposals describing how life began from abiotic processes undergo "non-academic in-house staff" review. Sounds ROUGH. If it passes the test, they will burn your data, hunt you down and kill you forward your proposal to one of 200 listed scientists listed on the website (my boss comes in at number 3). Any legitimacy this list of distinguished names adds to the website is destroyed by the color scheme (see Figure 1). Everyday is Easter at the Discovery Institute!

Figure 1: The retarded moose that birthed Sarah Palin learned HTML.

A quick glance through the "Suggested Reading" section lists Behe's Darwin's Black Box. Good lord.

But something jabbed at me as I considered replying to the email with youtube links of cats flushing toilets (sometimes I feel like that's kind of been played out). Why would he feel the need to CC a police detective in this email? Has Mr. Korn encountered prior trouble with the law? Further research diminished my amusement.

The answer is maybe. Michael Korn is suspected to be behind death threats sent to Univ. of Colorado biologists. However, I cannot confirm that this is the same guy. But also I kind of can't bring myself to care.