Some Expelled Reviews
Posted on April 18th, 2008 by blue collar scientistI just did a quick google search on reviews of Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed, and have come up with the following gems for your entertainment. And I have to say, my respect for movie reviews has gone up a lot in this process - not that I disrespected them before, but I did not have a lot of (ahem) faith that movie reviewers would be able to engage with the scientific issues as well as they have. In my searchings, I didn’t find any positive reviews that weren’t associated with religious or right-wing political publications - and then only two of those.
The Star Tribune gives it one-half out of four stars:
According to “Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed,” the source of all evil in the modern world is Darwinism, a philosophy that, the film posits, is responsible for everything from atheism to abortion, euthanasia to the Holocaust.
The New York Times leads with:
One of the sleaziest documentaries to arrive in a very long time, “Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed” is a conspiracy-theory rant masquerading as investigative inquiry.
Mixing physical apples and metaphysical oranges at every turn “Expelled” is an unprincipled propaganda piece that insults believers and nonbelievers alike. In its fudging, eliding and refusal to define terms, the movie proves that the only expulsion here is of reason itself.
From Time:
It’s in the film’s final third that it runs entirely off the rails as Stein argues that there is a clear line from Darwinism to euthanasia, abortion, eugenics and–wait for it–Nazism. Theories of natural selection, it’s claimed, were a necessary if not sufficient condition for Hitler’s killing machine to get started. The truth, of course, is that the only necessary and sufficient condition for human beings to murder one another is the simple fact of being human. We’ve always been a lustily fratricidal species, one that needed no Charles Darwin to goad us into millenniums of self-slaughter.
From the LA City Beat:
One might accuse Michael Moore of similarly facile, manipulative techniques – and I have – but Moore has never gone to lengths nearly as outrageous as the makers of Expelled. (For what it’s worth, he’s also funnier.)
In the third act, Stein and company move beyond mere visual associations, when they build a case linking Darwinism to Nazism – which is not merely insultingly lame, but also ranks as one of the cheapest, most offensive exploitations of the horrors of the Holocaust I’ve ever witnessed (and I’ve witnessed plenty).
Expelled is another expression of the right wing’s victim complex. It’s classic paranoid thinking: Since we’re pure and correct, any setbacks we suffer must be the result of an Evil Conspiracy. Communists are fluoridating our water. Purity of Essence. We couldn’t be doing substandard academic work. Our poor advancement must have to do with a blacklist! (Stein himself used this idea to bully Norman Lear into giving him a writing job.)
From the New York Post:
After all of his efforts to unhook the ID caboose from the creationism train, Stein makes it clear that his beef with Darwinism is that it weakens religion.
In a long, greasy detour, Stein shows that the Nazis were Darwinists. So what? They also liked skiing. Having Nazi fans doesn’t make Darwin wrong.
From Slant Magazine:
For a film about American freedom of expression and the necessity for open dialogue, it’s hard to imagine Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed being more one-sided, narrow-minded, and intellectually dishonest.
To their film’s catastrophic detriment, Stein and director Nathan Frankowski fail to provide concrete examples of the flaws in Darwin’s theory, content instead to simply have speakers (many with impressive credentials) state that it’s problematic and then treat such unsupported statements as verifiable truth. Nor, ultimately, do they examine the obvious and crucial religious underpinnings of the “intelligent design movement,” whose onscreen adherents deliberately refuse to speculate on the source of this creative “intelligence” because their opinion on the identity of this fundamental biological architect—God—would conclusively reveal Expelled as propaganda for a Christian-right movement whose own champion, Ronald Reagan, Stein ultimately depicts as his spiritual counterpart.
From E! Reviews:
A flunkout of a documentary, this features Ben Stein—still best known for his monotone “Anyone…anyone?”—advocating creationism, er, intelligent design, in science classrooms. Stein’s credibility is blown on this poorly constructed diatribe, and you’d be smart to save your bucks.
Plus, he’s tedious and unfunny.
With a heavy, heavy hand, the pic punctuates every scene with over-the-top archival footage—the Berlin wall, Stalin and other Cold War imagery.
Despite insisting “intelligent design” isn’t pro-God propaganda, Stein argues we’re waging a religious war (cut to cannon fire) with Darwinists smiting the faithful with—gasp!—atheistic ideas. Most outrageously, he plays the overused Nazi card—he tours an old concentration camp and notes Hitler himself was influenced by Darwin. Yes, kids, studying evolution leads to this (cut to dead prisoners).
Expelled pretends it wants to encourage debate but shuts down and edits around every Darwinian scientist who attempts to explain complex issues, as Stein makes snide remarks in voice-over.
From the Colorado Springs Independent:
Nazis? It’s all about Nazis?
In a parallel universe even crazier than our own, Ben Stein, former Nixon speechwriter turned ironic symbol of the anti-hip, may be making a documentary about how the Nazis used the “controversial” theory of gravity to make bombs fall to earth — so, of course, the theory of gravity must be wrong. But we are here, and in this universe Ben Stein is actually telling us that because the Nazis thought it would be a good idea to breed people like animals, the theory of evolution must be wrong.
It’s nuttiness right from the opening moments of Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed. Images of Nazi atrocities and the terrors of life behind the Berlin Wall are smugly deployed in an attempt to editorialize away basic scientific fact.
Expelled isn’t about “intelligent design,” about an alternative scientific theory, or even about academic freedom. It’s about Stein believing he has proven that acceptance of evolution leads to atheism (and also, we’re told, to such horrors as birth control). Hence, evolution cannot be allowed to be true. Even if it is.
From Newsday:
Ben Stein, the actor, lawyer, columnist and onetime speechwriter for Presidents Nixon and Ford, is probably smarter than you. He’s definitely smarter than I am. What’s galling about his new documentary, “Expelled,” is that he seems to think we’re both slobbering idiots.
In an increasingly hysterical tone, Stein lambastes Darwinians as misguided, ignorant fascists, cutting repeatedly to old footage of the Berlin Wall - a metaphor for squelched thought.
Finally, he unleashes his biggest attention-getter, holding Darwinism responsible for Nazi atrocities and genocide. I’m no lawyer, but that’s a pretty lousy argument.
Did Stein really think audiences wouldn’t balk at being suckered into a propaganda rally? Or was he preaching to the converted from the start? Stein claims to denounce the tyranny of dogma, then browbeats us with his own.
From Variety, whose reviewer is predisposed to like the movie:
Even more offensive is the film’s attempt to link Darwin’s “survival of the fittest” ideas and Hitler’s master-race ambitions (when in doubt, invoke the Holocaust), complete with solemnly scored footage of the experimentation labs at Dachau. Evocations of the Berlin Wall, treated as a symbol of a bullheaded scientific establishment on the verge of collapse, are equally fatuous.
The Village Voice:
[Stein's] thesis: Teaching Darwinian evolution but ignoring intelligent design in America’s public schools and universities is the biggest threat to American freedom today—bigger, presumably, than Al Qaeda, Iraq, and the recession combined. A series of interviews with ID true believers has him playing Michael Moore–dumb—no hard questions for the folks at the Discovery Center
ID’ers protest that they’re simply interested in secular alternatives to Darwinian evolution; their scientific opponents, meanwhile, are potential Communists and Nazis. Bizarre and hysterical.
The Orlando Sentinel, whose review was also run by the Chicago Tribune:
….Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed, [is] a cynical attempt to sucker Christian conservatives into thinking they’re losing the “intelligent design” debate because of academic “prejudice.”
It’s a rabble-rouser of a doc that uses all manner of loaded images, loaded rhetoric, few if any facts, dubious ID “experts” and mockery of hand-picked “weirdo” legit scientists to attack those who, Stein claims, are stifling the Religious Right’s efforts to inject intelligent design into science courses, science curricula and the national debate.
It just isn’t particularly funny. Or the least bit convincing.
I lost track of the number of times Stalin’s image hit the screen, and in the ways the movie equated science with Darwinism with atheism with Hitler or Stalin. Subtle, it’s not.
Stein (he co-wrote it) builds his movie on classic Big Tobacco Tactics.
On Rotten Tomatoes, the movie currently has a rating of less than one out of ten.
Update: As of Saturday, April 19, this post is number four in a google search of “expelled reviews,” and it is getting a lot of traffic. This post keeps switching places on the google front page with “Expelled Exposed,” so I figured that I’d better do an update to reflect more reviews that I’ve found over the last day. Here you are:
The Waco Tribune:
[The] film’s arguments are a rhetorical mishmash of straw men, red herrings, guilt by association, quote harvesting, gotcha interviews and post hoc ergo propter hoc (after this, therefore because of this) associations that may cause your head to pop. It’s a propaganda form highly polished by director/activist Michael Moore on the other end of the political spectrum.
Those coming to Expelled hoping to learn something about any research behind ID, a fair appraisal of weaknesses in evolutionary theories or — perhaps the film’s most glaring and telling omission — how Christian evolutionists reconcile faith and science will leave sorely disappointed. The latter is quickly dismissed by a chain of quotes that brand them as liberal Christians and duped by militant atheists in their efforts to get religion out of the classroom.
From TV Guide:
It’s hard to pinpoint the most insulting aspects of this obvious propaganda piece from Ben Stein, the eye-drops spokesman, conservative writer and pundit whom most people remember from a bit part in FERRIS BUELLER’S DAY OFF.
But surely the film’s greatest offense is the utter shamelessness with which it exploits the Holocaust, veering far off topic for a side trip to Nazi killing centers at Hadamar and Dachau in an attempt to tar Darwin with the old “Evolution led directly to eugenics and the Final Solution” brush. The camera’s slow tracking shots through the death camps are followed by a similar creepy crawl through Down House, where Darwin wrote On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection. None of this has anything to do with the validity of evolutionary theory or intelligent design, and only serves to point up how any theory can be used to justify evil ends.
From the Salt Lake Tribune:
The scholars Stein and the film’s producers interview say they just want an open debate where creationism - pardon, intelligent design - and Darwinist evolution can be discussed side-by-side. What’s wrong with that? Stein asks with mock-innocence.
Alas, the movie’s makers (Stein and co-writers Kevin Miller and Walt Ruloff, and director Nathan Frankowski) don’t debate honestly. Stein mocks university officials for not “getting off [their] script,” but says nothing about the repetitive talking points from the ID crowd. The ID folks complain that the term “evolution” is too vaguely defined, and yet never adequately define what “intelligent design” is. They swear they aren’t espousing religion, then try to discredit the leading evolutionary biologists - such as Richard Dawkins and P.Z. Myers - because they are atheists.
Oddly enough, the tactics employed in “Expelled” undercut the movie’s argument, most notably in the interviews with Dawkins and Myers and in Stein’s trip to Darwin’s British home (now a museum). Either the filmmakers suckered these participants under false pretenses, or the evolutionists are more open to debate than Stein suggests. Perhaps the intelligent-design proponents know that in a truly open debate, their argument isn’t fit enough to survive.
From the Seattle Times, hometown newspaper to the Discovery Institute:
Pop quiz: What is the real source of evil in the modern world? Greed? Intolerance?
Well, according to “Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed,” it’s Darwinism, described as a philosophy that posits the pointlessness of life and encourages the “de-privileging of human beings” — and as such is responsible for everything from atheism to abortion, euthanasia to the Holocaust.
But Jon Stewart is a lot funnier than Stein.
From BeliefNet:
Like the tobacco companies once they could no longer question the legitimacy of the scientific evidence connecting cigarettes and disease, Stein quickly shifts the debate from a head-to-head assessment of analysis of data to frame the issue as one of freedom of speech. The movie opens with archival footage not of science labs or the animal life on Galapagos Island, where Darwin first began to develop his theory, but of the construction of the Berlin Wall. Stein tries to draw a parallel between the wall that divided Germany and the impenetrable wall that keeps Intelligent Design out of the science establishment. But he is also associating Darwinian science with Godlessness, communism, and totalitarianism, with detours into Nazi atrocities and atheism so over-the-top that it becomes shrill and irrational.
The conservative Ayn Rand Institute:
“The premise of Expelled is that proponents of ‘intelligent design’ have been shunned, denied tenure, and even fired because of a conspiracy to quash the scientific evidence supporting their theory,” said Dr. Keith Lockitch, resident fellow at the Ayn Rand Institute. “But the truth is: there is no evidence supporting their theory. Intelligent design is completely devoid of any positive scientific content, and consists of nothing more than a religiously motivated attack on evolution. To the extent intelligent design advocates are facing obstacles in academia it is because they are not doing real science: they haven’t been ‘expelled’ they have flunked out of the scientific community, just as a faith healer would flunk out of medical school.
A Scientific American podcast reports on the movie’s dishonest quoting of Charles Darwin:
Toward the end [of the movie], Stein reads the following quote from the book Descent of Man: “With savages, the weak in body or mind are soon eliminated. We civilized men, on the other hand, do our utmost to check the process of elimination. We build asylums for the imbecile, the maimed and the sick. Thus the weak members of civilized societies propagate their kind. No one who has attended to the breeding of domestic animals will doubt that this must be highly injurious to the race of man. Hardly anyone is so ignorant as to allow his worst animals to breed.”
…I went to a full text of Descent of Man online and found the quoted passage. And then found the sentences that come right after where Stein stopped quoting.
So here’s Charles Darwin again, from Descent of Man: “The aid which we feel impelled to give to the helpless is mainly an incidental result of the instinct of sympathy, which was originally acquired as part of the social instincts, but subsequently rendered, in the manner previously indicated, more tender and more widely diffused. Nor could we check our sympathy, even at the urging of hard reason, without deterioration in the noblest part of our nature. The surgeon may harden himself whilst performing an operation, for he knows that he is acting for the good of his patient; but if we were intentionally to neglect the weak and helpless, it could only be for a contingent benefit, with an overwhelming present evil.“
(Update: It is now April 28, and this post is still getting a lot of traffic, so I wanted to provide a link to an article about the film by noted conservative columnist John Derbyshire and appearing in National Review. It is probably the strongest slapdown of the movie I’ve ever seen.)
National Review says:
…creationists have been morally corrupted by the constant effort of pretending not to be what they are. What they are, as is amply documented, is a pressure group for religious teaching in public schools.
…The creationists took the morally fatal decision to campaign clandestinely. They overhauled creationism as “intelligent design,” roped in a handful of eccentric non-Christian cranks keen for a well-funded vehicle to help them push their own flat-earth theories, and set about presenting themselves to the public as “alternative science” engaged in a “controversy” with a closed-minded, reactionary “science establishment” fearful of new ideas. (Ignoring the fact that without a constant supply of new ideas, there would be nothing for scientists to do.) Nothing to do with religion at all! I think this willful act of deception has corrupted creationism irredeemably. The old Biblical creationists were, in my opinion, wrong-headed, but they were mostly honest people. The “intelligent design” crowd lean more in the other direction. Hence the dishonesty and sheer nastiness, even down to plain bad manners, that you keep encountering in ID circles.
Our scientific theories are the crowning adornments of our civilization, towering monuments of intellectual effort, built from untold millions of hours of observation, measurement, classification, discussion, and deliberation. This is quite apart from their wonderful utility — from the light, heat, and mobility they give us, the drugs and the gadgets and the media…. Simply as intellectual constructs, our well-established scientific theories are awe-inspiring.
And now here is Ben Stein, sneering and scoffing at Darwin, a man who spent decades observing and pondering the natural world — that world Stein glimpses through the window of his automobile now and then, when he’s not chattering into his cell phone. Stein claims to be doing it in the name of an alternative theory of the origin of species: Yet no such alternative theory has ever been presented, nor is one presented in the movie, nor even hinted at. There is only a gaggle of fools and fraudsters, gaping and pointing like Apaches on seeing their first locomotive: “Look! It moves! There must be a ghost inside making it move!”
The “intelligent design” hoax is not merely non-science, nor even merely anti-science; it is anti-civilization.
April 18th, 2008 at 2:16 am
Sounds awful! Not that I would expect anything different. I’m not sure if/when this *cough* movie will be released in Australia, but I’ll be keeping a close eye on it, and at the first whiff of its presence here I’ll be linking to this post as widely as possible!
I don’t suppose too many people will take me seriously if I haven’t seen the film though, so I must find a way of watching it without actually supporting the production with my hard-won cash or adding to their headcount.
s.
April 18th, 2008 at 2:48 am
[...] Blue Collar Scientist has published a meta-analysis of reviews of that giant steaming turd that Ben Stein expelled from [...]
April 18th, 2008 at 6:33 am
[...] A helpful blogger has excerpted and provided links to reviews of the film: Blue Collar Scientist
April 18th, 2008 at 7:22 am
Despite the bad reviews, I still want to see this just so I can witness how much ignorance can be put into a movie. The trailer alone is one big fallacy of logic.
Unfortunately, I refuse to hand over even 1 cent to the people involved in making this insulting display of stupidity and attempted manipulation of the masses.
April 18th, 2008 at 7:52 am
I’m sure we won’t have to pay a thing - except precious minutes forever taken from our lives. The damned thing’ll be up on YouTube soon enough, efforts to prevent piracy notwithstanding.
Or we can just wait until the local church screens a DVD. I’m sure that won’t be long in coming….
I should stand out in front of theaters today with a copy of this post and do everyone a public service. We’re in a recession. Folks don’t need to be wasting their money on pure schlock. They could get more educational benefit out of Horton Hears a Who.
April 18th, 2008 at 8:29 am
Wow. I wouldn’t expect such emotional vitriol unless Mr. Stein has possibly raised some questions that make folks a little uncomfortable with a purely naturalistic perspective. Most people have a firm conviction that they have transcendent value and meaning that makes them more than the result of time, matter and chance. But to admit that out loud and wonder about our source cracks open the door of the universe and brings up that pesky issue of a God who might bump us out of the god business! After all, how far can we really let this having an open mind thing go!
Maybe we are Horton, and if we listen very hard we might hear a tiny voice….
April 18th, 2008 at 10:58 am
[...] http://bluecollarscientist.com/2008/04/18/some-expelled-reviews/ [...]
April 18th, 2008 at 11:36 am
Alan M.*, based on your point about the “emotional” response to this film, Ishtar must then be one of the greatest films of all time.
I had a firm conviction in the existence of Santa Claus back when I was a youth. Strange how he never seems to reply to my letters anymore.
Finally, when it comes to Dr. Seuss I prefer The Cat in the Hat Comes Back, an excellent allegorical critique of the Christ myth.
* Assuming that’s not a sarcastic smile behind your comment.
April 18th, 2008 at 12:33 pm
I’m pleased to find that nobody is taking this movie seriously except for conservative Christian wingnuts. Anybody who wants a pretty thorough debunking of the thing should check out skeptic.com for more info about how the “oppressed” ID folks featured in the film were in fact, not even given the censure they probably deserved. One woman was in a temporary, non tenure track position. She didn’t publish anything, and got lots of complaints from students about her crappy teaching. She, like 70% of non-tenure track college facutly, did not get her contract renewed. She wasn’t fired any more that I have been (am am currently a non-tenure track professor who isn’t coming back….don’t worry about me….I’ve got a position in a P.H.D. program lined up for next year).
She should have had her ass canned for some of the unprofessional nonsense she did in the classroom. If you ask me she was treated pretty damn nicely.
Another of the “persecuted scientists” (at Iowa State) still has his freakin’ job!!! Yeah, that’s Macarthyism at its worst right there……
How exactly is it that Christians feel it okay to lie when it comes to politics?
April 18th, 2008 at 1:20 pm
[...] Collection of reviews [...]
April 18th, 2008 at 1:40 pm
What? No mention of the movie stealing “Imagine” from the Lennon estate? For shame. Imagine ‘Imagine’ in this type of movie…shivers. Hope they get their asses sues off. WALRUSGUMBOOT BEATLES NEWS
April 18th, 2008 at 1:47 pm
Wow. So much emotion here. The nihilists like Kafka really were right, you know. In a naturalistic universe all pretense of meaning and purpose are only illusions. So these issues shouldn’t bother us- let’s let Mr. Stein and his cohorts wander about in their delusion!
Of course, there are some very difficult consequences to these presuppositions…..
April 18th, 2008 at 2:11 pm
Alan,
We’d much rather enjoy an illusion than suffer from your delusion.
As for all the emotion here…. We have gusto for life. We don’t want anything to do with an empty, but supposedly godly, passionless existence that numbs human feelings of the sort that make life so rich and worth living.
April 18th, 2008 at 2:26 pm
Alan M. writes: “In a naturalistic universe all pretense of meaning and purpose are only illusions.”
I take it you’re not a philosopher, then.
(See, e.g., Robert Nozick, _Philosophical Explanations_; Erik Wielenberg, _Value and Virtue in a Godless Universe_; Russ Shafer-Landau, _Whatever Happened to Good and Evil?_.)
April 18th, 2008 at 3:14 pm
Alan, would the vitriolic response of the creationist/ID crowd to evolution indicate that they are uncomfortable with a purely dualistic perspective? My emotion comes from the equation of naturalism with the worst evil of modern times. How dare a Christian accuse “Darwinists” of fomenting the Holocaust when Christians have been killing Jews for centuries. As a believer in evolution I have no guilty consciencen, nor should I. Christians in particular have a lot to answer for. When you can show me a mass killing perpetrated by those who accept the theories of Darwin I will concede Bens’ point. Of course Ben will never concede the point that much more murder has been done in the name of God than in the name of Darwin.
April 18th, 2008 at 3:46 pm
Let me add that Stalin was an atheist but not a believer in Darwins ideas. Darwins’ ideas were considered capitalistic and were rejected by good commies like Stalin, they don’t like the competitive aspect of Darwinian evolution. They prefered Lemarkean evolution.
April 18th, 2008 at 4:05 pm
I don’t get it. Of course Darwinism led to Nazism, the link is direct and obvious. Hitler believed the country was becoming weak because human beings were trying to overcome natures weakest link cull. Sick children weren’t meant to be in hospitals, they were meant to die.
April 18th, 2008 at 4:24 pm
Dwindle, you shouldn’t tell lies.
Hitler believed that the country was becoming weak because inferior races were overrunning the pure German stock. For that reason, Hitler killed the Jews, and deprived them of hospitals, but gave sick Aryan children health care. In these ideas, he was largely following the example of Martin Luther, the christian reformer who wrote a hateful book suggesting the Jews should be deprived of property, freedom, and their lives. He was also following the examples of christians over more than 1,500 years who periodically carried out pogroms against the Jews - anti-Jewish riots in which Jewish businesses were burned, Jewish homes were destroyed, and Jewish families were put to death in mob violence. These things were taking place hundreds of years before Darwin lived.
Hitler showed he disbelieved evolution by putting to death deformed infants, or encouraging it. Evolution explains not only how such conditions arise, but also shows unequivocally that such people are still human, something which Hitler denied.
What is definitely true is your claim that you “don’t get it.” Anyone with a shred of human feeling would understand how deeply offensive your remarks are to anyone who was a victim of Nazi violence. And everyone with the barest shred of morality would repudiate your support for Nazism.
April 18th, 2008 at 6:52 pm
Thanks for taking time to collect these reviews. I have copied the URL and will be pasting it into comments wherever I find people trying to defend this movie.
I must admit I’ve not seen the movie myself yet - it’s not out here in Hong Kong and is unlikely ever to be released here. But I have seen the trailers and read reviews from people whom I respect.
Like the theory of evolution - it’s possible I could change my mind about the movie if a huge amount of new evidence came along. But the probability of that happening seems unlikely in the extreme.
April 18th, 2008 at 6:59 pm
Mr. Lippard writes “I take it you’re not a philosopher, then.” That’s true. I have a BA in philosophy from the University of Washington, but that hardly qualifies me as a philosopher! The degree plus $3.50 will get me a latte at Starbucks, however.
To take Erik Wielenberg’s premise as an example, though, illustrates my point. He posits that “the existence of intrinsically good activities would make it possible for us to bring internal meaning to our lives.” But the 18th century Scottish materialist David Hume conclusively put this hope out of reach by pointing out that in a materialist universe there can be no “ought”; there can only be what “is”. In other words, matter (which everything, including human activity, can be reduced to) can no more have an intrinsic good than it can have an intrinsic evil. It can be painful or pleasant, convenient or inconvenient but what we mean by the word “good” or “meaningful” is a transcendent sort of value that goes beyond the material world. If it doesn’t, we are back at our “values” of comfort or convenience, categories that hardly imbue life with meaning. After Hume and Kant, philosophy split in two, with the rational pursuit of scientific truth (logical positivism and linguistics) on the one hand and the irrational assertion of meaning as an act of the will (the non-nihilistic existentialists) on the other.
Kant showed that we can’t reach the transcendent with the materially oriented categories of our minds. However, if that transcendent were to whisper to us, I wonder if we couldn’t judge whether what it was communicating fits with what we see in the world around us and in the human condition….
April 18th, 2008 at 7:03 pm
PS- It sounds like some folks might not know that Ben Stein is not a Christian. He’s Jewish.
April 18th, 2008 at 7:23 pm
Alan, it sounds to me as though you overestimate my readers’ ignorance of Ben Stein (and of many other things too), and underestimate the ability of people like Ben Stein to opportunistically exploit anything they can to viciously attack whatever they have prejudices against, even if they disrespect their own ethnic or religious community in the process.
Ben Stein gets no free pass for desecrating the memories of the millions dead in Nazi concentration camps and the thousands who died or were injured fighting his brutal regime in the war, even if he is Jewish. Speaking as the relative of someone whose had his jaw and half his face shot off in a skirmish while closing in on a concentration camp, I’m extremely upset that Stein and thousands of his moronic creationist minions think none of that would have been necessary if only Darwin had never existed. That’s insane, and extremely offensive.
April 19th, 2008 at 3:51 am
Come now, the Holocaust was as fictional as the science that evolution is based on! I mean, if the moon landing was a hoax, all our national leaders are lizards, and we’re inhabited by spiritual parasites, then certainly the few dozen Jews killed in those camps must have been euthanized, right? Now let me get my magical underwear on before the ritual stoning of adulterers and unruly youds . . .
April 19th, 2008 at 5:32 am
Pardon my overuse of the word Christian when invoking the name of Ben Stein. I was aware of the fact that he is Jewish, but, that’s what makes it even more disgusting. It appalls me to know that he is so willing to use the Holocaust in this way. He knows and you know that Darwin had nothing to do with the philosophy that spawned the Nazis, don’t tell me they taught you that at UW.
April 19th, 2008 at 6:45 am
[...] posting on Some Expelled Reviews has been updated with another seven reviews, bringing the total to nineteen. Just thought I’d [...]
April 19th, 2008 at 8:24 am
Well, the daily duties of life call. Thanks for the opportunity to post on your blog. I haven’t done this before and it was kind of interesting!
Please remember that there are many folks in the intelligent design camp that still believe in evolutionary processes, the rigorous pursuit of science, and whose knuckles do not drag on the ground (as long as we are standing up straight).
Those people are every bit as appalled as everyone else at cruelty perpetrated by those of any belief system.
And those people are embarrassed by the rantings of obscurantists who live in “bunkers” on their “compounds” and insist that the earth is only 10,000 years old. (”Reasons.org” is an interesting place to see a rational approach to ID with a specific effort to counter what I would call “hillbilly ID”.)
Anyway, thanks!
April 19th, 2008 at 8:41 pm
say what you will about national socialism but at least its an ethox….
April 20th, 2008 at 5:02 am
[...] Its reaassuiring to see that the world hasn’t gone batshitt mental though Rotten Tommatoes: Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed reviews at bluecolarscientist.com [...]
April 20th, 2008 at 7:07 am
The Ayn Rand Institute is far from conservative. Their politics would have to be called libertarian (though they hate the word), and they are all atheists.
April 20th, 2008 at 2:20 pm
John Locke once asked this question:
“What came first, mind or matter”?
For the materialists who do science, the answer is a forgone conclusion and no other answers can be considered. Mindless matter came first and everything from the universe, to evolution to your decisions and actions are mind-less matter in motion. And anybody who presents factual evidence that suggests otherwise is just a toothless, “backwater”, snake-handling, creationist idiot who also probably believes in fairies, gnomes and hobgoblins.
Today they don’t burn you at the stake, but they do burn your reputation and career at the stake for even questioning materialism.
This documentary exposes most modern scientists for what they are: puppets to this belief system. And by asking simple, direct questions Ben Stein shows his deftness as a masterful puppeteer.
Go see this documentary. It’s hilarious!
April 20th, 2008 at 2:21 pm
I is obvious that many of the negative comments concerning Ben Stein’s film are concerned with tarring and feathering of the messanger, rather than commenting on the theme of the film. Mr Stein is critical of the “intellectual establishment” for not allowing any discussion of Intelligent Design in the classroom. Anyone intelligent enough to read and understand “Evolution - A Theory in Crises” cannot possibly believe in evolution. Richard Dawkins and company are scared to death to have to defend their “theory” - and that is all it is.
April 20th, 2008 at 5:19 pm
Most reviews of EXPELLED appear to villify Mr Stein for simply raising the issue of academic freedom as it applies to the teaching and research of modern science. This is really a fairness issue since many high school and college students will never get the opportunity to examine the claims of ID proponents considered alongside traditional Darwinist-oriented science. If students and professors could be allowed by American universities the opportunity to render a balanced examination of ID juxtaposed with Darwin-based evolutionary science wuthout fear of condemnation, loss of tenure or black-balling then opinion, reason and fact would enable conclusions to be drawn. The real story is finding those thousands of hard as nails scientists who hold a personal belief in God and how they reconcile that belief with the mainstream science community. Ask them why many are still in the closet–discover why the robust expression of Judeo-Christian thought on university campuses today unhinges even the most ardently objective professional scientist and triggers a spasmodic, agnostic, nihilistic and amoral barrage of attacks on those who have the temerity to ask whether ID ought be discussed at all.
April 20th, 2008 at 8:58 pm
Imagine that….a collection of bad reviews by a bunch of lefty journalists. You don’t suppose they might be biased do you?
April 20th, 2008 at 9:25 pm
[...] about seeing the *movie* Expelled, No intelligence Allowed? You might want to go to this blog: Here It brings together reviews from all over the [...]
April 20th, 2008 at 11:28 pm
To Walter: great movie quote, but get it right mate, it’s:
“Say what you will about the tenets of National Socialism, at least it’s an ethos!”
And to the ID-ers out there, as a scientific skeptic, I’m genuinely disappointed in Expelled. I would have liked an interesting, fact-filled, balanced documentary that weighed the two sides with honesty, and this dirty-tricks propaganda show is not it.
It’s like the yoga people trying to get itself on ESPN as a sport… sorry Yoga, you’re just not a sport! There is no Yoga league, you’re not a sport! And then the yoga people shoot back with “But we ARE a sport, and we deserve the attention of sport-lovers everywhere!”
“Sorry Yoga - even thumb-wrestling has more chance of getting its own show than Yoga does”
Bad example, but seriously, without any data or evidence other than mere arguments, Intelligent Design really ISN’T science and should stop trying to be.
April 21st, 2008 at 10:56 am
First I would like to say I am one of the “right wing nut jobs”/Christians mentioned with explicitly throughout this blog. I have a couple questions that I am asking quite honestly and not trying to get a rise out of anyone:
1) Why is the concept of God/Yahweh/Allah or any other god under attack? What has any of these deities done to you?
2) How is my faith in God and His creation of the universe any different then your faith in the start of life? After all life had to have a starting point, if we can have a civilized discussion on this I think we would be moving forward rather then slinging mud at everyone who believes different from us.
April 21st, 2008 at 11:28 am
Tom,
Thanks for your considerate and thoughtful comment. I’ll take a stab at answering your questions, speaking only for myself:
Why is the concept of God/Yahweh/Allah or any other god under attack?
I think because the people who mount such attacks see deity concepts as harmful in various ways. Don’t you think that is so? It sure appears to me that Dawkins or PZ Myers believe that the concept of a deity is harmful to people - they’ve written books and blogs about the topic at length.
That said, I do not attack religious belief as such. I freely and with gusto attack religious behavior that is incompatible with civilization, and behavior incompatible with its own professed values; and I also attack religiously-motivated disbelief in facts. That is not the same as attacking a particular god or belief in god.
I’ve always been very careful here to distinguish between religious extremists and the religious. They are two different categories in my mind. As far as I’m concerned, people can believe whatever they want, as long as their beliefs do not bring harm upon their fellow people - and as long as that is true, I will take no interest whatever in what god you or anyone else believes in. I’m certainly no evangelist for atheism.
What has any of these deities done to you?
I think it is fair to say that none of those deities has done anything to me - no more than it could be said that the tooth fairy has done anything to me, or that leprechauns have done anything to me.
I suspect we are here at odds over our conception of god and of victimhood. I on the one hand don’t feel it necessary to believe in a god that does things to me. You on the other hand seem to presuppose that such disbelief can only be motivated by a sense of victimhood. I’m certainly no victim of god’s, and have no such mentality.
How is my faith in God and His creation of the universe any different then your faith in the start of life?
It is fundamentally different, because I do not have faith in the start of life.
Let me make a digression here and note that by saying that I have faith in the start of life, you are slandering me - telling lies about me - and this is very offensive to me. If you are genuinely interested in the “civilized discussion on this” that you propose, you would do well to avoid antagonizing those who disagree with you by attributing to them from the start things they do not believe. Religious extremists typically do this sort of thing deliberately - it is called a “straw man” argument, where you make up (as in make-believe) how one’s opponents think and behave, and then attack that made-up image, instead of dealing with reality. If you want to have your civilized discussion, let’s deal with the reality of my thinking on the start of life:
I do not know how life began. I am familiar with a number of hypotheses that I think might account for it, but I do not know which one is correct, or if any of them are correct. There may very well be ways that life could have started that biologists have not thought of yet. So I’m prepared, if I live long enough, for scientific thought about biogenesis to change a lot in the years to come. I’m prepared to find that one of the hypotheses I know about turns out to be the most plausible, or indeed even comes to be considered true. But I’m also prepared to find that my current thinking on these matters is terribly amateurish and profoundly wrong - and that as we gain further knowledge we will get a lot closer to the truth.
This position can in no way be described as “faith.” It is exactly the opposite - I have no faith in my current understanding, and am prepared to concede to uncertain, and possibly being wrong, about the issue.
Faith on these matters, by contrast, appears to me to be ‘giving assent to a particular idea about the origin of life, even in the absence of enough evidence to convince most everyone who thoughtfully considers it.’ It implies a degree of being convinced, or a degree of certainty about the subject - which I do not have. Of course, if compelling evidence were presented that a god created all species at once with the deistic equivalent of a magic wand, then I would promptly adopt that opinion. I am not too proud to be wrong in even this way. But I do not currently find the evidence in support of that proposition to be compelling, and certainly no more compelling than the several hypotheses about the origins of life that I’m familiar with.
That’s the bottom line for me - looking at nature, at what we know about how life works at the very low level of biochemistry, at what we know about the evolution of life over vast periods of time, at what we know of the fossil record, at what we see in living taxa as signs of evolutionary relatedness, at the way evolution has led to vaccination, genomics, cures for diseases, and other benefits to humans and animals - all this evidence and more leads me to accept that some hypotheses about the origins of life are more likely than others.
I hope your questions have been adequately answered.
April 21st, 2008 at 2:35 pm
Ameche said:
Hitler believed that the country was becoming weak because inferior races were overrunning the pure German stock. For that reason, Hitler killed the Jews, and deprived them of hospitals, but gave sick Aryan children health care. In these ideas, he was largely following the example of Martin Luther, the christian reformer who wrote a hateful book suggesting the Jews should be deprived of property, freedom, and their lives.
That’s absurd. Hitler himself argued:
Interviews with Nazis by other historians show that the Nazis thought that their views were rooted in biology, not historical prejudices. For example:
I just tried to publish this on Wikipedia but a Darwinists censored it, perhaps ironically making the point about the proto-Nazi nature of “biological thinking.” As the Nazis put it:
April 21st, 2008 at 2:48 pm
…at the way evolution has led to vaccination, genomics, cures for diseases, and other benefits to humans and animals - all this evidence and more leads me to accept that some hypotheses about the origins of life are more likely than others.
This type of reasoning is probably why so many journalists have an almost visceral reaction to Expelled, images of Progress seem to be ingrained in their minds and therefore an attack on Darwinism is an attack on Progress. What’s worse opposing imagery is being shown to them which conflict with the image of Darwinian principles as the engine of Progress and instead showing them to be destructive and so on. Their reviews reduce to the conditioning and the imagery in their minds and little else. For example, they certainly don’t know much about history so instead of dealing with historical facts they shift towards emotional arguments about how upset they are and so on.
April 21st, 2008 at 2:57 pm
Bad example, but seriously, without any data or evidence other than mere arguments, Intelligent Design really ISN’T science and should stop trying to be.
You seem to be being disingenuous, the main point of the film is that scientists like the fellow who was apparently setting up an evolutionary informatics computer lab in order to define ID are being discriminated against. On the one hand Darwinists say, “Show me the data.” while on the other they say, “ID is not scientific and scientists who try to provide it should be expelled from science!”
A similar argument: “ID isn’t science and it isn’t falsifiable.” vs. “Yay! Now that I have shown how irreducible complexity is falsified we can admit that it’s science… but falsified!”
And another: “Theology can have nothing to do with science.” vs. “God wouldn’t make a panda’s thumb like this, therefore natural selection did. Ummm, and anyone who answers my theological argument isn’t being scientific so I can just ignore them.”
Etc. All of this seems to stem from being quite double-minded, something which is pointed out in the film with the imagery of the Berlin wall and so on.
April 22nd, 2008 at 12:58 pm
i get the feeling that Ben Stein’s goal is to promote dangerously-free thought, especially more thinking about motivations that drive American academia and a lot of other behind-the-scenes worldview that we tend to take for granted.
April 22nd, 2008 at 5:03 pm
[...] http://bluecollarscientist.com/2008/04/18/some-expelled-reviews/ You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site. [...]
April 22nd, 2008 at 5:33 pm
mynym,
ID is not science because it is not presented scientifically. If you wish to talk disingenuous, then you need look no further than the ID crowd claiming to have evidence which weakens evolution, but when we do reply “show me the data”, the science flies out the door again and watchmakers and gods fly in.
The cry of discrimination is weak, cowardly and, indeed, more disingenuous than any that the defenders of good, sound science have made against you or your fellow faithful. You want to start a ID lab? Go right ahead. The Discovery Institute has money. The makers of this film found money. No one’s stopping anyone who wishes to perform actual science around ID. And no one will expect you to hire researchers who are strong proponents of evolution and might skew your work (sound familiar?). Arguing that you’re being left out by ‘big science’ (what a pitiful attempt at polarization by association) is about as compelling as me arguing about the church not having something positive to say about gays. As in “not very”.
And as for your notions about the ‘visceral reaction’ of journalists… well, talk about the pot calling the kettle black. You brush away their reactions as normalized noise which merely clutters up your argument. But then in your next reply you argue about how ID proponents are… brushed away. Perhaps the critics’ visceral reaction is because they saw straight through the bullshit like so many others have.
Your playbook is weak and full of fail. Your arguments are old and full of bull.
April 22nd, 2008 at 5:57 pm
PS - Following on what Ameche mentioned:
“Hence today I believe that I am acting in accordance with the will of the Almighty Creator: by defending myself against the Jew, I am fighting for the work of the Lord.” Adolf Hitler - ” Mein Kampf”
“First, to set fire to their synagogues or schools and to bury and cover with dirt whatever will not burn, so that no man will ever again see a stone or cinder of them. This is to be done in honor of our Lord and of Christendom… Second, I advise that their houses also be razed and destroyed. For they pursue in them the same aims as in their synagogues… Third, I advise that all their prayer books and Talmudic writings, in which such idolatry, lies, cursing, and blasphemy are taught, be taken from them… Fourth, I advise that their rabbis be forbidden to teach henceforth on pain of loss of life and limb… [continues to #8]” - Martin Luther - “On the Jews and Their Lies”
April 22nd, 2008 at 7:32 pm
ella rache- epic points are epic
April 23rd, 2008 at 8:21 pm
Those who don’t believe in evolution now are exactly the same as those ( and there were many for many many years) who didn’t really believe the Earth was round, even when all the scientist held it as absolute. Given this analogy, assume how you would feel if some still wanted to teach flatness in school and equate earth roundness as an enemy of religion and all that is good.
If people who don’t really buy evolution, really grasp (similar to earth roundness) how the understanding of it gives them many many benefits and makes the modern world work - to me it is the height of ignorance to want the gifts it brings but do not want to believe it because ignorance fits more with their world view. What you eat, medicine you take, understanding of modern agriculture and pest control (mutations that make pesticides and antibiotics work/not work) even (a field I am in) modern computer design software using genetic programming (a huge new and successful field) that make new tools including super efficient antennas for the space shuttle ( and better looking computer games - it’s everywhere). You may not want to believe in evolution but us scientists are using it and the facts it to make your world better. Just like the understanding the earth being round made scientists of the day use that data to support that time.
The last sad part is this is mostly ( in educated cultures) a USA problem. In a study of advanced countries ( educationally) , the USA was 2nd to last on the list (~30) in the percentage believing in evolution. This is a dark and ignorant time. If you want to know (as the thread holds) why people are emotional about movies and thinking like this - it is not about being scared to debate, it is frustration about having to debate. Again just imagine you had to time after time even though you want to move the world and culture ahead and sovle real problems bat had to constantly stop and answer the ” but we don’t fall off or see the curvature, how can you be sure it is round …
April 24th, 2008 at 6:35 am
My wife, six kids and I much enjoyed the movie. There was laughter in the theatre because there were comedic moments on a serious subject.
How a man thinks, does effect his view of the world and of that person’s fellow man. (chance grouping of cells vs. unique creation with purpose)
Darwinian evolution (macro) is not supported by the evidence. Where are all those missing links in the fossil record?
God bless Ben Stein for addressing the closed minded academia problem.
April 25th, 2008 at 12:40 pm
1) Why is the concept of God/Yahweh/Allah or any other god under attack? What has any of these deities done to you?
We had these two towers in New York… any of your friends die there? Mine did.
2) How is my faith in God and His creation of the universe any different then your faith in the start of life? After all life had to have a starting point, if we can have a civilized discussion on this I think we would be moving forward rather then slinging mud at everyone who believes different from us.
I don’t have faith, I have science. Evolution doesn’t deal with the origin of life. Did you go to school at all? You might want to get your money/taxes back.
See, here’s what riles me - DO YOUR OWN FREAKIN’ RESEARCH. And if you’re really too dumb to understand this stuff, just stay out of it. Seriously. Don’t open your mouth to prove that you’re an idiot.
Are other atheists/science-lovers tired of these idiots? They’re really starting to get on my nerves.
April 25th, 2008 at 10:29 pm
Jeff - Thanks for the kind words. I am deeply flattered. :)
Bruce - I hope that you take your kids to the library next and let them read a bit more on their own. For all the talk about Nazis, I’m afraid the movie left out some fundamental things, like “what is evolution?” and “what is ID?”. You see… the statement “Darwinian evolution (macro) is not supported by the evidence. Where are all those missing links in the fossil record?” is both wrong and misinformed.
First, let’s be clear on one point; we’ve learned a lot since Darwin. So, we’re talking about Evolution/Natural Selection here, not something called “Darwinism”. A Darwinism would be a phrase or remark that someone called Darwin might have said. Some people made that up and somehow talked you into repeating it.
Secondly, the evidence does quite clearly support evolution. In fact, the only people denying that are people with a particular ideological axe to grind, like the makers of Expelled, for instance. We have fossils of walking fish, snakes with legs, reptiles that are bird-like, whale precursors with legs, mammals with reptile vestiges, reptiles with fur.
Lastly, ‘academia’ — but, not all science is done by academics, I should point out, let’s say scientists — can’t be closed-minded if they’re to compete in the harsh realm of peer-reviewed science. Someone is always scrutinizing your work and checking your facts and research. If your work or theories are not built on verifiable, repeatable evidence, you’ll be swiftly taken down a peg and ‘back to the drawing board’. Sitting back like some sort of Science King will get you one only thing: expelled… from your job.
The basic core of science is something you and I do every day. It’s not some secret order with rituals involving test tubes. It’s weighing the evidence of something and evaluating the results. Taking a child’s temperature, leveling a brick wall… we’re gathering evidence, measuring, observing. That’s what science is. It’s not about whether God is in that brick wall. That’s not science’s business.
Seriously. Take your kids to the library. Let them read. Let them have a look at the evidence for themselves. And maybe you’ll crack open a book or two as well and see for yourself? The basic thing that separates you from a researcher is information and reasoning. And all that information is out there for you and anyone to see (just don’t let someone tell you which books to read and not read… read it all and judge for yourself).
April 26th, 2008 at 2:36 pm
Great compilation! Here’s an especially good one by Ken Hanke, at the Asheville Mountain X Press, the alternative weekly in western North Carolina:
http://www.mountainx.com/movies/review/expelled_no_intelligence_allowed
April 27th, 2008 at 3:08 pm
[...] actually not sure whether the blog will survive or not. Currently the Expelled reviews post is getting hit by StumbleUpon, Digg, and now Pharyngula readers. Traffic today - Sunday, when I [...]
April 28th, 2008 at 4:07 am
An excellent post, thank you for putting that together. Must have taken a while!
I keep wondering if we will have any biology questions from Stein on America’s Most Smartest Model.
April 28th, 2008 at 5:59 am
I urge anyone thinking of seeing it to just download it using BitTorrent, or Google Videos (I’m sure it’s there somewhere) rather than doing the following:
1) Dedicating 2 consecutive hours to watching it - if you download it, you can pause it long enough to throw up
2) Wasting money that could be better spent on almost anything else in existence.
3) Allowing the light’s-are-on-but-nobody’s-home retards running the film a cut from your hard-earned money.
If you must see it, for the love of Cthulu don’t bloody pay for it.
April 28th, 2008 at 6:21 am
[...] Expelled has been exposed. Ben Stein’s godawful tragedy of a mockumentary has been revealed for the blubbering nonsense it really is: lying theist propaganda. The emperor has no clothes, Ben. [...]
April 28th, 2008 at 8:07 am
If its the Darwinists that are responsible for all the evil in the world, then why is it that whenever anyone kills a cultural or religious group, they profess to do so in the name of someone or something OTHER than Darwin?
Hitler and Luther said they were doing it for God.
The Crusaders said they were doing it for God.
Stalin said he was doing it for the state.
Bush said he was doing it for Jesus.
Jihadists say they do it for Allah.
Where can I find a genocide that champions Darwin? Anyone… anyone?
*chirp chirp*
April 28th, 2008 at 9:48 am
I linked to your post over at my blog. Excellent collection of reviews!
April 28th, 2008 at 10:17 pm
I’m gonna get the DVD. I have an idea where I can make a drinking game out of it, every time Stalin or the Berlin wall is shown, we have to take a drink. I’m pretty sure we’ll get plastered pretty quick.
April 30th, 2008 at 3:37 pm
I think this is the beginning of the end of creationism as a contender for our children’s schoolbooks, and Ben Stein handed us this victory.
April 30th, 2008 at 9:24 pm
Even the Anti-Defamation League is denouncing Expelled! They didn’t give a review of the movie, but they did issue this press release.
http://adl.org/PresRele/HolNa_52/5277_52.htm
May 2nd, 2008 at 9:40 am
thanks for being interested in the idea and the conversation all who
have written here.
for me, i want to know a few things of the process of evolution:
do the most mixed varieties of living things contain the most genetic
diversity?
do the most specialized varieties of species have the least genetic diversity?
If yes, this means they are usually successful in a specific environment, and then would only survive in that environment?
does evolution weaken a species when it becomes specialized?
does evolution, like inbreeding, pass on weakness?
in specific environments? (sure those too weak die.)
do the mutations in the pesticides and medicines mentioned above
do a lot of killing of unwanted living things?
i am most interested in the conversation about the things we can
understand. i am not offended to think God could have created
life, but i think it is most important that we think as best we can
about what we observe.
the whales and snakes with legs and bird reptile fossils may need to be
discussed further, whales sometimes use these legs in mating, and
belugas come to shore… there are some distinct differences in the
nature of birds and reptiles that may be unlinkable with survival, have
to revisit that to get the facts correct though. point here is there is
alot to think about, and best not to be hasty.
i believe there has been a lot of fast science to support evolution as
explanation for origin and even for origin of species…it certainly is true
that what reproduces viably is what survives, but more than that,
i think it is most safe to remain critical. the mecahnics of mutation
is fascinating, and worth study. also the question of the information and
mechanics and working of the dna strand in the cell… now there is where
there is room for good science and answer seeking and conversation.
as to the nazi talk and debate…it seems best we avoid any repeating of it, and we treat humans with respect, and care. i have heard alot of hate in
the responses here, that is sad. religious people have committed this
sort of killing too. that is sad, and a weight on the shoulders of honest
believers. similarly those who may have used darwinian thought to
support such death. also there has been good done by people
there is no law against doing good.
i believe best to keep a conversation and listen to all and take what you
can to build your beliefs on. if there is God in person he is part of this
conversation. we are people and part of this conversation and for
the consequences of the acts we make because of our beliefs, lets
all be patient with each other, even with Mr. Stein, and Darwinian scientists… more than that hurts us all.
May 3rd, 2008 at 5:16 am
[...] morning, “cls” left a comment on the Expelled Reviews post, which I’d really like to see some discussion of. The comment brings up an issue that has [...]
May 5th, 2008 at 5:50 am
Re Gerald Berry
Mr. Berry is obviously unfamiliar with Michael Dentons’ current thinking on the subject of the theory of evolution. Based on an interview he gave to the Un. of California Extension Service in 2002, Prof. Denton has backed away from almost all the claims made in the book cited by Mr. Berry. He currently accepts virtually all of the neo-Darwinian theory, with the proviso that he does not think that natural selection provides a complete mechanism for driving evolution, although he admits that he has nothing better to offer and that it is at least a partial mechanism.
Re RMcCreight
Mr. McCreights’ version of academic freedom would allow instructors to advocate a flat earch, a geocentric solar system, deny the bacterial theory of disease causation, deny the link between HIV and AIDS, etc. Not freedom, chaos.
May 5th, 2008 at 3:42 pm
Did anyone consider that this is just one huge majestic spoof on the ID v. Darwinist discussion, with all of us the fall people? After all, Stein is a comedian by trade as well.
May 5th, 2008 at 6:20 pm
I’ll believe anything as long as there is greater sound evidence supporting it versus the opposing view.
I haven’t seen the move but just from the reviews it seems as if this movie will ultimately hurt the intellectual design movement due to the holes in their argument.
May 6th, 2008 at 7:00 pm
Would it be correct to say that scientists have not reproduced by experimentation the natural mechanisms which can produce a living cell, but that many are “confident” that evolution through natural mechanisms is how that first cell came into existence? Is not “confidence” (lat. con-fide, with faith) another way of saying that they have faith in macro evolution as true, and that without laboratory proof? Perhaps theories about origins should be discussed only in Philosophy/Theology Class.
Many atrocities have been commited in the name of Christianity, only to prove that those committing them were not followers of Christ at all, for He taught clearly - “Love your enemies!”
May 7th, 2008 at 12:14 am
From The Times (UK) April 20, 2008, last 4 paragraphs:
A few days ago, Dawkins, perhaps secretly relishing his traditional Hollywood role as a British cinematic villain, did get to see the film, in a rollicking night that mixed farce with irony. He went along to a public screening in Minneapolis with a friend, Professor Paul Myers of the University of Minnesota Morris, who not only appears in the film, albeit briefly, but is also thanked in the credits.
A producer of the film, however, spotted the American biology prof in the queue and got security guards to escort him from the cinema because he was “not welcome”.
Dawkins, meanwhile, strolled in and, when the “shoddy and boring” film ended, stirred up the absurdity of the expulsion at Expelled’s question-and-answer session with the producers.
It was, said one blogger, as if Beelzebub himself had arisen in a puff of smoke in the temple. People left the film crossing themselves. “And that was a lot more fun than the film itself.”
May 7th, 2008 at 3:39 am
Just because Darwinism is “right” (in the scientific perspective) doesn’t mean that it doesn’t have downsides.
In one case some mean-meaning people clearly appropriated Darwinism to ‘dilute’ inferior races. In another case some so-called scientists made brutal experiences on people in the name of science, Nazi Germany being a quite clear example.
If the first chapter of ‘The Shock Doctrine’ you can read about experiments being made by psychologists on brain washing. Though later disavowed by the scientific community, initially at least it was all considered mainstream.
My point here is that there is a huge difference between what Science is and what some people make of it, or in its name. *Exactly* the same thing happens with religion: religion is one thing, and another is what some mad quacks make of it.
If the argument that religion is stupid *because* some people use it for the wrong ends (terrorism, despotism, people control, etc.), so you must argue that Science is also stupid because of somewhat similar misuses.
(Note that I’m an atheist. Religion, Creationism, etc. *are* stupid. But they are stupid in its essence and not at all because of their unintended results).
May 13th, 2008 at 4:45 am
Anyone know what happened to the ‘Expelled’ blog? It appears to be down.
July 19th, 2008 at 9:31 pm
This was a disgrace of a movie. It was like an attempt to get the most laughable lies into 1 film. People were lied to and tricked into being in this movie. Shame on the filmmakers.