More slime at Judge Jones

How do you tell when a lawyer is lying?  When his lips are moving.

One of the hoariest jokes around.

Let's update it, shall we.

How do you tell the Discovery Institute is lying?

When they uses ellipses in a quote.

In its latest effort to defame Judge Jones the DI quotes from Judge Jones' Farleigh Dickinson comencement speech and sets it off against a quote from Frank Lambert's, The Founding Fathers and the Place of Religion in America (Princeton University Press, 2003).

Here's the first sentence of the DI's version of Judge Jones' commencement speech:

"...our Founding Fathers... possessed a great confidence in an individual's ability to understand the world and its most fundamental laws through the exercise of his or her reason... "

Here's the first sentence of Lambert, according to the DI:

"The Founding Fathers... had great confidence in the individual's ability to understand the world and its most fundamental laws through the exercise of his or her reason."

uh-oh....you see them?  ellipses!!

Here's the full sentence from Judge Jones speech:

"As has been often written, our Founding Fathers were children of The Enlightenment. So influenced, they possessed a great confidence in an individual's ability to understand the world and its most fundamental laws through the exercise of his or her reason."

Oh, he attributed it after all.  He did not hold out the idea as his own.  Ellipses are a wonderful thing.

Comments

[Joe Carter]

The areas that are in bold are the sections where Jones speech matches Frank Lambert’s text verbatim:

As has been often written, our Founding Fathers were children of The Enlightenment. So influenced, they possessed a great confidence in an individual's ability to understand the world and its most fundamental laws through the exercise of his or her reason.

[snip]

The Founders believed that true religion was not something handed down by a church or contained in a Bible, but was to be found through free, rational inquiry. At bottom then, this core set of beliefs led the Founders, who constantly engaged and questioned things, to secure their idea of religious freedom by barring any alliance between church and state.

The addition of “As has often been written” refers only to the commonly held belief that the “Founding Fathers were children of The Enlightenment.” It doesn’t refer to any of the other passages. Besides, if you are going to quote extensively from one author you don’t say “As has often been written.” I seriously doubt that those passages by Frank Lambert were “often written” verbatim by others.

You may be able to claim that its acceptable in the legal field to copy other peoples work without attribution. But the standard doesn't carry over to commencement addresses.

Jones got caught. Admit it. In fact, it's not to late to retract this post, Joe. Don't let the DI sucker you into their rope-a-dope scheme. ; )

[Joe McFaul]

Joe,

You got your testicles removed when you took this most recent job.

Ex preacher at your own site explianed this situation perfectly:

You're looking to a commencement address for originality, Joe? Probably the only place you could find a higher level of unattributed "borrowing" is in the pulpit. In fact, I was taught in my homiletics classes in seminary not to give attributions as it seriously interrupts the flow of the sermon. We weren't to copy entire sermons but were encouraged to use quotes from others without stopping to give a verbal footnote. We were taught that we could always give the original sources to anyone who asked.

[Gary Hurd]

Joe (McFaul), If nothing else, I am glad that this latest DI flapdoddle has got you posting again.

GH

[Bill]

To be continued...

[jibal]

a) Jones copied without attribution; Joe Carter is right, and the blogger is being intellectually dishonest.
b) As Joe McFaul notes, this is common in public speeches.
c) It's an absurd ad hominem; what Jones wrote in his speech has nothing to do with the validity of his Dover decision; DI and the rest of the IDiots are disgusting piles of putrid scum, as well as being intellectually dishonest.

[bjm]

Take a look at the website Crowther references for Jones' speech- he obviously hasn't read it comletely. The quotes are followed by an asterisk which leads you to a sentence at the end of the text:

*Quotations from The Founding Fathers and the Place of Religion in America by Frank Lambert (Princeton University Press, 2003).

Yet more sloppy research from the DI.

[W. Kevin Vicklund]

Actually, Google cache reveals that the quotemarks and footnote were added sometime on or after November 29, 2006. That said, it is clear that "As has often been written" is intended to convey that some of the following words are from an outside, written source. I suspect, but can't say for certain, that audio of his speech would confirm that he was quoting - there are ways to alter speech patterns to indicate quotes without having to state that a phrase is a quote.

[Joe Mc Faul]

Yup, you're right. I was pretty sure I'd have caught the attribution that is now there, so didn't reference it.

Nevertheless, could it be that it was Dickenson University, and not the Judge, that forgot to put the attribution for the quote? Judge Jones, after all, gave an oral speech (any other kind?) and wouldn't recite footnotes in the middle of the speech.

If Dickenson recorded the speech and prepared a transcipt, the College may have overlooked the atribution and then posted it later. No big deal.

Never attribute to maliciousness what can be attributed to a mistake.

[Larry Fafarman]

Kevin Vicklund said,
--"it is clear that "As has often been written" is intended to convey that some of the following words are from an outside, written source."--

As Joe Carter pointed out, this phrase "as has often been written" does not immediately precede some of the quoted material. It can't be claimed that this phrase covers everything that follows in a speech. In fact, I feel that this phrase should not be presumed to cover anything outside the sentence in which it appears.

Furthermore, Jones was not just referring to something that "has often been written" but was quoting something that a specific author wrote.

--"I suspect, but can't say for certain, that audio of his speech would confirm that he was quoting - there are ways to alter speech patterns to indicate quotes without having to state that a phrase is a quote."--

You "suspect"? The only thing I have learned to suspect of Judge Jones is the worst.

Speech patterns are not a clear indication that something is being quoted. The standard way of indicating a quotation during a speech is to raise two fingers in both hands. Is there a video showing that Jones did this?

Joe Mc Faul said,
--"Nevertheless, could it be that it was Dickenson University, and not the Judge, that forgot to put the attribution for the quote? Judge Jones, after all, gave an oral speech (any other kind?) and wouldn't recite footnotes in the middle of the speech."--

The transcript is presumably a verbatim copy of Jones' speech. The question is whether Jones did anything during the speech to indicate that he was quoting, particularly in regard to the quote that was not immediately preceded by the phrase "as has often been written." Dickinson College was very foolish to put those quote marks and the footnote in his speech because these things only call attention to his apparent plagiarism.

As for plagiarism in public speeches being a common practice, Al Gore and Senator Joe Biden got into trouble for that.

Joe Carter said,
--"Jones got caught. Admit it. In fact, it's not to late to retract this post, Joe. Don't let the DI sucker you into their rope-a-dope scheme."--

Right. This post's attack on the DI may backfire. And exonerating Jones of the charge of plagiarism here would do nothing to clear him of the charge that his Dover opinion's ID-as-science section was one-sided and excessively copied from the plaintiffs' opening post-trial brief.