Creationism As Conspiracy Theory – The Case Of The Peppered Moth

Originally posted on 3 Quarks Daily on August 12 2013; on that same day, a school board member in Nebraska used slides of Well’s Icons of Evolution to argue that the school should teach “the evidence for and against neo-Darwinian evolution;” details here and here.

 

Comparison of carbonaria and typica mounted against post-industrial treetrunk, 2006. Licenced under GFDL by

the author, Martinowski at nl.wikipedia. [Click image to enlarge.]

 

The peppered mothprovides a textbook example of industrial melanism and its reversal. Once a classroom classic, then much criticised, and finally rehabilitated through further observation, the story also shows how real science works. The response of the creationist and “Intelligent Design” community provides a textbook example of a conspiracy theory in action, with cherry-picked quotations, allegations of collusion and fraud, and refusal to acknowledge new evidence.

This moth comes in two main varieties, mottled pale (typica), and dark-coloured (carbonaria). The dark form was first noticed, as a rarety, in 1848. Then came widescale industrialisation and grime. By 1895, 98% of the peppered moths in Manchester were dark, and in 1896