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Reviews of Expelled
by Scientific American, Michael Shermer, John Rennie, Fox News
Update:
Expelled Exposed
http://expelledexposed.com/
TIME Review
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1729703,00.html
City Beat Review
http://www.lacitybeat.com/cms/story/detail/win_ben_stein_s_sympathy/6929/
Orlando Sentinel
Click here (long URL!)
Not Even Fox Likes It.
Ben Stein: Win His Career
Reposted from:
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,348468,00.html (scroll down the page to "Ben Stein: Win His Career")
After seeing a new non-fiction film starring Comedy Central's Ben Stein, you may not only be able to win his money, but also his career.
Stein is that whiny little guy with the monotone voice that makes him seem funny and an unlikely "character" for TV appearances. But that career may be over come April 18, when a movie he co-wrote, narrates and appears in, called "Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed," is released.
Directed by one Nathan Frankowski, "Expelled" is a sloppy, all-over-the-place, poorly made (and not just a little boring) "expose" of the scientific community. It's not very exciting. But it does show that Stein, who's carved out a career selling eye drops in commercials and amusing us on sitcoms, is either completely nuts or so avaricious that he's abandoned all good sense to make a buck.
To wit: Stein, Frankowski and pals say in "Expelled" that perfectly good scientists and educators are being stigmatized for wanting to teach their students creationism and "intelligent design" — in other words, junk science — in addition to or instead of conventionally accepted Darwinism. You see, Stein, like some other celebrities, finally has shown his true colors and they aren't so pretty.
The gist of Stein's involvement is: He's outraged! He believes in God! God created the universe! How can we not avail our students of this theory? What do you mean we're just molecules?
What the producers of this film would love, love, love is a controversy. That's because it's being marketed by the same people who brought us "The Passion of the Christ." They're hoping someone will latch onto an anti-Semitism theme here, since there's a visit to a concentration camp and the raised idea — apparently typical of the intelligent design community — that somehow the theory of evolution is so evil that it caused the Holocaust. Alas, this is such a warped premise that no one's biting.
The whole idea of Stein, a Jew, jumping on the intelligent design bandwagon of the theory of evolution begetting the Nazis is so distasteful you wonder what in — sorry — God's name — he was thinking when he got into this. Who cares, really, if "Expelled" is anti-Semitic? It will come and go without much fanfare.
But Stein is another matter. Can he really be amusing selling eye drops or acting like a nebbish on game shows if we now have this new insight into his thinking?
You know Ben Stein from his voice. He used it to intone Ferris Bueller's name iconically at the beginning of that 20-year-old Matthew Broderick movie. His laconic delivery and deadpan presence have given him a benign celebrity — until now.
But this is what he wrote last fall on the "Expelled" movie Web site:
"Darwinism is still very much alive, utterly dominating biology. Despite the fact that no one has ever been able to prove the creation of a single distinct species by Darwinist means, Darwinism dominates the academy and the media. Darwinism also has not one meaningful word to say on the origins of organic life, a striking lacuna in a theory supposedly explaining life.
"Alas, Darwinism has had a far bloodier life span than Imperialism. Darwinism, perhaps mixed with Imperialism, gave us Social Darwinism, a form of racism so vicious that it countenanced the Holocaust against the Jews and mass murder of many other groups in the name of speeding along the evolutionary process."
In a word: Urgggh. Suddenly Stein is not so amusing anymore. I want my eye drops from someone else.
PS: Following "The Passion" release pattern, "Expelled" will open wide on the 18th, but mostly in rural and poor neighborhoods. It's got just one theater in all of New York City, in Times Square, none in places like Beverly Hills or wealthier, better-educated urban neighborhoods where more "evolved" people might live.
According to the film's Web site, the producers are in a whopping 45 theaters in North Carolina, and a mere seven in Massachusetts, 35 in Georgia, 11 in New Jersey, four in Connecticut and one in Vermont. And so on. There are huge numbers of screens in Florida and Texas taking the film, particularly seven in San Antonio. If I lived in the Deep South, I'd boycott the filmmakers for thinking of me as this gullible and unsophisticated.
Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed--Ben Stein Launches a Science-free Attack on Darwin
by Michael Shermer
Reposted from:
http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=ben-steins-expelled-review-michael-shermer
In 1974 I matriculated at Pepperdine University as a born-again Christian who rejected Darwinism and evolutionary theory—not because I knew anything about it (I didn't) but because I thought that in order to believe in God and accept the Bible as true, you had to be a creationist. What I knew about evolution came primarily from creationist literature, so when I finally took a course in evolutionary theory in graduate school I realized that I had been hoodwinked. What I discovered is a massive amount of evidence from multiple sciences—geology, paleontology, biogeography, zoology, botany, comparative anatomy, molecular biology, genetics and embryology—demonstrating that evolution happened.
It was with some irony for me, then, that I saw Ben Stein's antievolution documentary film, Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed, opens with the actor, game show host and speechwriter for Richard Nixon addressing a packed audience of adoring students at Pepperdine University, apparently falling for the same trap I did.
Actually they didn't. The biology professors at Pepperdine assure me that their mostly Christian students fully accept the theory of evolution. So who were these people embracing Stein's screed against science? Extras. According to Lee Kats, associate provost for research and chair of natural science at Pepperdine, "the production company paid for the use of the facility just as all other companies do that film on our campus" but that "the company was nervous that they would not have enough people in the audience so they brought in extras. Members of the audience had to sign in and a staff member reports that no more than two to three Pepperdine students were in attendance. Mr. Stein's lecture on that topic was not an event sponsored by the university." And this is one of the least dishonest parts of the film.
Click here to continue:
http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=ben-steins-expelled-review-michael-shermer
Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed--Scientific American's Take
Reposted from:
http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=sciam-reviews-expelled
You wouldn't expect Scientific American to take a particularly positive view of a movie that espouses intelligent design over evolutionary biology. Then again, you wouldn't expect the producers of said film—in this case, Ben Stein's Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed—to offer the editors of said magazine a private screening.
Associate producer Mark Mathis showed up at our offices with a preview of Expelled in hand. That's right, the unexpected screening happened. The unexpected positive reviews did not.
Click here to continue:
http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=sciam-reviews-expelled
Ben Stein's Expelled: No Integrity Displayed
Reposted from:
http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=ben-steins-expelled-review-john-rennie
A shameful antievolution film tries to blame Darwin for the Holocaust
By John Rennie
In the new science-bashing movie Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed, Ben Stein and the rest of the filmmakers sincerely and seriously argue that Charles Darwin's theory of evolution paved the way for the Holocaust. By "seriously," I mean that Ben Stein acts grief-stricken and the director juxtaposes quotes from evolutionary biologists with archival newsreel clips from Hitler's Reich. Prepare for an intellectual night at the cinema.
No one could have been more surprised than I when the producers called, unbidden, offering Scientific American's editors a private screening. Given that our magazine's positions on evolution and intelligent design (ID) creationism reflect those of the scientific mainstream (that is, evolution: good science; ID: not science), you have to wonder why they would bother. It's not as though anything in Expelled would have been likely to change our views. And they can't have been looking for a critique of the science in the movie, because there isn't much to speak of.
Click here to continue:
http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=ben-steins-expelled-review-john-rennie
Expelled Exposed
http://expelledexposed.com/
TIME Review
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1729703,00.html
City Beat Review
http://www.lacitybeat.com/cms/story/detail/win_ben_stein_s_sympathy/6929/
Orlando Sentinel
Click here (long URL!)
Not Even Fox Likes It.
Ben Stein: Win His Career
Reposted from:
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,348468,00.html (scroll down the page to "Ben Stein: Win His Career")
After seeing a new non-fiction film starring Comedy Central's Ben Stein, you may not only be able to win his money, but also his career.
Stein is that whiny little guy with the monotone voice that makes him seem funny and an unlikely "character" for TV appearances. But that career may be over come April 18, when a movie he co-wrote, narrates and appears in, called "Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed," is released.
Directed by one Nathan Frankowski, "Expelled" is a sloppy, all-over-the-place, poorly made (and not just a little boring) "expose" of the scientific community. It's not very exciting. But it does show that Stein, who's carved out a career selling eye drops in commercials and amusing us on sitcoms, is either completely nuts or so avaricious that he's abandoned all good sense to make a buck.
To wit: Stein, Frankowski and pals say in "Expelled" that perfectly good scientists and educators are being stigmatized for wanting to teach their students creationism and "intelligent design" — in other words, junk science — in addition to or instead of conventionally accepted Darwinism. You see, Stein, like some other celebrities, finally has shown his true colors and they aren't so pretty.
The gist of Stein's involvement is: He's outraged! He believes in God! God created the universe! How can we not avail our students of this theory? What do you mean we're just molecules?
What the producers of this film would love, love, love is a controversy. That's because it's being marketed by the same people who brought us "The Passion of the Christ." They're hoping someone will latch onto an anti-Semitism theme here, since there's a visit to a concentration camp and the raised idea — apparently typical of the intelligent design community — that somehow the theory of evolution is so evil that it caused the Holocaust. Alas, this is such a warped premise that no one's biting.
The whole idea of Stein, a Jew, jumping on the intelligent design bandwagon of the theory of evolution begetting the Nazis is so distasteful you wonder what in — sorry — God's name — he was thinking when he got into this. Who cares, really, if "Expelled" is anti-Semitic? It will come and go without much fanfare.
But Stein is another matter. Can he really be amusing selling eye drops or acting like a nebbish on game shows if we now have this new insight into his thinking?
You know Ben Stein from his voice. He used it to intone Ferris Bueller's name iconically at the beginning of that 20-year-old Matthew Broderick movie. His laconic delivery and deadpan presence have given him a benign celebrity — until now.
But this is what he wrote last fall on the "Expelled" movie Web site:
"Darwinism is still very much alive, utterly dominating biology. Despite the fact that no one has ever been able to prove the creation of a single distinct species by Darwinist means, Darwinism dominates the academy and the media. Darwinism also has not one meaningful word to say on the origins of organic life, a striking lacuna in a theory supposedly explaining life.
"Alas, Darwinism has had a far bloodier life span than Imperialism. Darwinism, perhaps mixed with Imperialism, gave us Social Darwinism, a form of racism so vicious that it countenanced the Holocaust against the Jews and mass murder of many other groups in the name of speeding along the evolutionary process."
In a word: Urgggh. Suddenly Stein is not so amusing anymore. I want my eye drops from someone else.
PS: Following "The Passion" release pattern, "Expelled" will open wide on the 18th, but mostly in rural and poor neighborhoods. It's got just one theater in all of New York City, in Times Square, none in places like Beverly Hills or wealthier, better-educated urban neighborhoods where more "evolved" people might live.
According to the film's Web site, the producers are in a whopping 45 theaters in North Carolina, and a mere seven in Massachusetts, 35 in Georgia, 11 in New Jersey, four in Connecticut and one in Vermont. And so on. There are huge numbers of screens in Florida and Texas taking the film, particularly seven in San Antonio. If I lived in the Deep South, I'd boycott the filmmakers for thinking of me as this gullible and unsophisticated.
Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed--Ben Stein Launches a Science-free Attack on Darwin
by Michael Shermer
Reposted from:
http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=ben-steins-expelled-review-michael-shermer
In 1974 I matriculated at Pepperdine University as a born-again Christian who rejected Darwinism and evolutionary theory—not because I knew anything about it (I didn't) but because I thought that in order to believe in God and accept the Bible as true, you had to be a creationist. What I knew about evolution came primarily from creationist literature, so when I finally took a course in evolutionary theory in graduate school I realized that I had been hoodwinked. What I discovered is a massive amount of evidence from multiple sciences—geology, paleontology, biogeography, zoology, botany, comparative anatomy, molecular biology, genetics and embryology—demonstrating that evolution happened.
It was with some irony for me, then, that I saw Ben Stein's antievolution documentary film, Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed, opens with the actor, game show host and speechwriter for Richard Nixon addressing a packed audience of adoring students at Pepperdine University, apparently falling for the same trap I did.
Actually they didn't. The biology professors at Pepperdine assure me that their mostly Christian students fully accept the theory of evolution. So who were these people embracing Stein's screed against science? Extras. According to Lee Kats, associate provost for research and chair of natural science at Pepperdine, "the production company paid for the use of the facility just as all other companies do that film on our campus" but that "the company was nervous that they would not have enough people in the audience so they brought in extras. Members of the audience had to sign in and a staff member reports that no more than two to three Pepperdine students were in attendance. Mr. Stein's lecture on that topic was not an event sponsored by the university." And this is one of the least dishonest parts of the film.
Click here to continue:
http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=ben-steins-expelled-review-michael-shermer
Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed--Scientific American's Take
Reposted from:
http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=sciam-reviews-expelled
You wouldn't expect Scientific American to take a particularly positive view of a movie that espouses intelligent design over evolutionary biology. Then again, you wouldn't expect the producers of said film—in this case, Ben Stein's Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed—to offer the editors of said magazine a private screening.
Associate producer Mark Mathis showed up at our offices with a preview of Expelled in hand. That's right, the unexpected screening happened. The unexpected positive reviews did not.
Click here to continue:
http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=sciam-reviews-expelled
Ben Stein's Expelled: No Integrity Displayed
Reposted from:
http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=ben-steins-expelled-review-john-rennie
A shameful antievolution film tries to blame Darwin for the Holocaust
By John Rennie
In the new science-bashing movie Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed, Ben Stein and the rest of the filmmakers sincerely and seriously argue that Charles Darwin's theory of evolution paved the way for the Holocaust. By "seriously," I mean that Ben Stein acts grief-stricken and the director juxtaposes quotes from evolutionary biologists with archival newsreel clips from Hitler's Reich. Prepare for an intellectual night at the cinema.
No one could have been more surprised than I when the producers called, unbidden, offering Scientific American's editors a private screening. Given that our magazine's positions on evolution and intelligent design (ID) creationism reflect those of the scientific mainstream (that is, evolution: good science; ID: not science), you have to wonder why they would bother. It's not as though anything in Expelled would have been likely to change our views. And they can't have been looking for a critique of the science in the movie, because there isn't much to speak of.
Click here to continue:
http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=ben-steins-expelled-review-john-rennie
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Posted: Wednesday, April 9, 2008 | PermalinkComments 1 - 50 of 62 |
Reload Comments | Back to Top | Page Numbers2. Comment #157994 by Apemanblues on April 10, 2008 at 12:23 am
I'm happy to see that the movie (and 'Intelligent Design' in general ) is being resoundly trashed for the nonsense that it is, but it's sad to see the poor and uneducated of the world once again being targeted by parasitic religious con-men. Other Comments by Apemanblues
3. Comment #158005 by j.mills on April 10, 2008 at 12:58 am
FOX NEWS doesn't like it?! If that isn't proof of evolution, what is?! :) Other Comments by j.mills
4. Comment #158007 by alan baylis on April 10, 2008 at 1:08 am
I am very surprised by the panning of this by Fox News. I wonder if Ailes or any of the other bigwigs saw this honest review before it went out. If not, will we see some rowing back?I hope my cynicism of Fox is wrong in this case, because this is one review in particular which Stein and Co. will not like one little bit!
Other Comments by alan baylis
5. Comment #158009 by Daniel Palmer on April 10, 2008 at 1:09 am
Anyway - at least ONE group appears impressed by the film
Wow... prime example of doublethink!
Intellectual dishonesty is the fugliest type of self-delusion, this reviewer seems to revel in it.
Other Comments by Daniel Palmer
6. Comment #158012 by Ian on April 10, 2008 at 1:24 am
Well I do have to thank Expelled and Michael Shermer for answering an open question: Just how long the Cambrian Explosion actually took - 80 million years.Those paeleontologists do deal in large timescales, don't they?
Anyone want an airbag which inflates in 80 million years?
Which reminds me of a collegue I used to work with in a garage. Blythly, he assured us that airbags do not explode, "It's just that the gases expand really, really quickly."
Other Comments by Ian
7. Comment #158024 by Richard Dawkins on April 10, 2008 at 2:09 am
Somewhere on Pharyngula recently, PZ Myers made the following excellent point. Obvious when you think about it, but it really needed to be spelled out.What Hitler adopted in his eugenic approach to humans was nothing to do with Darwin or natural selection. Instead, it was the whole principle of ARTIFICIAL selection, which had been known to domestic breeders for centuries, even millennia. Any fool in a farmyard or a pigeon loft could see that artificial selection causes evolutionary change, and that was what Hitler wanted to do with humans. It was Darwin's genius to see that the same principle applied in the wild through NATURAL selection. That was what was Darwin had over garden-variety artificial selection, and that was precisely NOT what Hitler adopted. What Hitler adopted was precisely garden-variety artificial selection, the version that everybody has always known about but prefers not to apply to humans.
I'd like to track down PZ's article on this, because it is really excellent. It must have come out around the time we were all talking about how he was expelled from Expelled. Meanwhile, the above is my own summary of his point.
I would add that if Hitler had thought of natural selection at all, it would have been selection between RACES, not selection between INDIVIDUALS as Darwin thought of it. In other words, a kind of group selection. Darwin's much misunderstood subtitle, "The preservation of favoured races in the struggle for life" used the word "race" in a special sense which had nothing to do with Hitler's sense. Darwin definitely was NOT referring to "races" in the modern sense. We should translate "favoured races" today as "those individuals within a population who possess favoured genes".
Richard
Other Comments by Richard Dawkins
8. Comment #158027 by kaiser on April 10, 2008 at 2:23 am
Enter Richard Dawkins. Dawkins, a prominent evolutionist, outspoken atheist and the bestselling author of The God Delusion, is featured throughout the film. In one segment, he sits down with Stein for a heart-to-heart. After dancing around several pointed questions about how life began, Dawkins finds himself at a logical impasse with no surplus of sci-fi rhetoric. He's finally forced to concede that, indeed, an intelligent being may have created life on earth. However, that being could not have been "God," but rather, it must have been some organic, alien life form. Of course, that alien life form has to have been a product of "Darwinian evolution."
Through tears of wild laughter, audience members watch as Dawkins â€" apparently grasping the dizzying nature of his own circular argument â€" turns three shades of red and becomes purply tight-lipped.
Dawkins? ... Dawkins? ...
But apart from space aliens, the general consensus among the evolutionary scientists interviewed was that all life, including human life, likely began when lightening struck a mud puddle (you know, like Frankenstein but without all the prefab body parts). This was then followed by a series of unexplainable, unprovable and totally random events which occurred over umpteen million years, eventually resulting in ... you.
From http://www.cwfa.org/articles/14984/CFI/family/index.htm
Other Comments by kaiser
9. Comment #158036 by Richard Dawkins on April 10, 2008 at 2:43 am
I presume Kaiser is quoting, and does not stand by the ludicrous words that appear to stand in his name (Comment #158027).As I explained in my own review of the film, my highly improbable science fiction speculation was an attempt to bend over backwards to give Intelligent Design its best shot, in order to demonstrate how unlikely its best shot -- and therefore Intelligent Design itself -- really is. This kind of hypothetical speculation is a well-recognized technique in scientific, and indeed philosophical discourse. For example the late John Maynard Smith used it in his classic attack on Group Selection, in Nature 1964. He set his ingenious mind to thinking of the best group selection model he could find. He called this 'best shot' model the Haystack Model and he then went on to show that the assumptions needed in order to make the Haystack Model work were highly improbable. In other words, he was making a sophisticated argument AGAINST group selection. But the equivalent of a Ben Stein might have misunderstood Maynard Smith by shouting from the rooftops: "Official. Maynard Smith believes group selection happens in haystacks".
The Maynard Smith kind of argument by reductio isn't really so hard to understand, unless you are as thick as Ben Stein apparently is. I hope and believe that Kaiser is not being equally stupid, but he urgently needs to clarify his own motive in posting this remarkably stupid quotation without any explanation.
Richard
Other Comments by Richard Dawkins
10. Comment #158041 by Steve Zara on April 10, 2008 at 2:50 am
Comment #158024 by Richard DawkinsThis is probably the post you have in mind
http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2008/03/the_simple_falsehood_at_the_he.php
Other Comments by Steve Zara
11. Comment #158042 by irate_atheist on April 10, 2008 at 2:50 am
9. Comment #158036 by Richard Dawkins -
One argument against Intelligent Design could be the lack of the former aspect amongst it's proponents...
Other Comments by irate_atheist
12. Comment #158049 by yussel123 on April 10, 2008 at 3:01 am
The claim that Darwin's theory of evolution combined with natural selection gave us the gas chambers of the Nazis is not worthy of serious consideration.Hatred of Jews which culminated in the Holocaust was a direct result of 1500 or more years of indoctrination BY THE CHURCH. The religious people, who supposedly believed in the Jesus as the Prince of Peace and the Son of God, fanned the fires of Jew hatred. There is a direct line that goes from the Jew-hatred printed in "Der Sturmer" to Luther's writings on the Jews, to say nothing of the writings of the Church Fathers.
Other Comments by yussel123
13. Comment #158054 by rod-the-farmer on April 10, 2008 at 3:08 am
In scrolling through some of the links in this article, I found the followinghttp://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=15-answers-to-creationist
on the Scientific American web site. Not bad. Perhaps quite useful as a source most people would recognise as among the most reputable.
Other Comments by rod-the-farmer
14. Comment #158056 by Richard Dawkins on April 10, 2008 at 3:11 am
This is probably the post you have in mind
http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2008/03/the_simple_falsehood_at_the_he.php
That's the one. Thank you very much Steve Zara.
Richard
Other Comments by Richard Dawkins
15. Comment #158058 by yussel123 on April 10, 2008 at 3:16 am
If I may ask the following question:If Hitler's version of Evolution was bad science, why did the scientists in Nazi Germany go along with it?
Other Comments by yussel123
16. Comment #158059 by Vaal on April 10, 2008 at 3:17 am
Thanks rod-the-farmerI have bookmarked that. Looks like "expelled" is getting the reviews it deserves, although as already mentioned, it is only aimed at a target audience.
However, it has taken such a battering that it may actually be the greatest own goal that the IDiots have ever undertaken, and will be the butt of jokes for years.
Hopefully Ben Stein will be remorselessly ribbed. I am looking forward to him appearing in South Park, and other irreverent comedies.
Other Comments by Vaal
17. Comment #158063 by epeeist on April 10, 2008 at 3:28 am
Comment #158058 by yussel123 Is this a rhetorical question?
If Hitler's version of Evolution was bad science, why did the scientists in Nazi Germany go along with it?
Scientists are human as well you know, so the answer is why did politicians, engineers, church goers, fisherman and any other group you can mention go along with it?
You might also ask why Lysenko was so successful in the Stalinist Soviet Union.
If you want answers to why individual scientists went along with it then you are going to have to look at the biographies and psychology of the individuals involved.
Other Comments by epeeist
18. Comment #158076 by bugaboo on April 10, 2008 at 3:48 am
"If Hitler's version of Evolution was bad science, why did the scientists in Nazi Germany go along with it? "Fear?
Other Comments by bugaboo
19. Comment #158091 by black wolf on April 10, 2008 at 4:11 am
Wow, that Fox review is brutal, and rightly so. It also highlights the fact that the movie is scheduled to open mainly in select rural southern theaters, where, the author suspects, the filmmakers are deliberately targeting the not-so-well-educated (gullible?, indoctrinated? - you decide) populace. Who, judging from easily discernable comments on various message boards and blogs, evidently think that an opinion on educational and science matters is what the pastor tells you to think. Any move submitting decisions on the content of any educationial cultural level, to the consciously and proudly displayed herd mentality of that flock is inevitably bound to be un-American, un-democratic and plainly a huge step backward. This must never happen. I applaud Mr. Friedman for his uncompromising and clear-thinking view.Michael Shermer concentrates on the ID movement itself, as featured in Expelled. All I can say is, if intellectual and general dishonesty were criminal, the mindbogglingly deceitful creationism/ID folk would be stacking up life sentences by now. Shermer: "Unless God reaches into our world through natural and detectable means, he remains wholly outside the realm of science." While this is perfectly true, the creationists declare that God does influence the world, at least by fiddling people's emotions or messing around with DNA. The ID creed is:"we are science as long as we declare this to happen. just give us the money already and we'll find God's tracks for sure". Given that they've stirred the shot glass a bit and have received countless undeserved but nevertheless incredibly patient replies, they know very explicitly that that is not how science works. They know perfectly well that their definition of science would include phrenology, astrology, alchemy and so on. And they also know that real science has moved past these ideas for dozens of decades. Creationism/ID is a direct jump back into the ideological center of 18th century pseudoscience. They are stuck in their narcisstic hubris and want everybody else stuck with them.
Other Comments by black wolf
20. Comment #158095 by bugaboo on April 10, 2008 at 4:17 am
The Nazis also incorporated the weird ideas of Ernst Haekel into their "science". This guy thought that in order to investigate the evolution of life you could stop digging for fossils and look at embryonic development-recapitulation as he called it. I seem to remember that he suggested that by looking at embryos one could prove that jews were further down the evolutionary scheme than dogs. He had read Darwin but had got it totally muddled. You can still see his drawings in fairly recent school text books (1980s at least).The same books that show that famous gradation whereby on the left hand side of the page there is something that looks like a lemur, towards the right a chimp, second from right is an african man and finally a fine specimin of a white european. This was under the evolution section at the end of the textbooks. Really fucked up.Other Comments by bugaboo
21. Comment #158109 by black wolf on April 10, 2008 at 4:39 am
I own a few books inherited from my grandparents from the Nazi era (auto-biography of Göring, a small book called 'Little Race Study' etc.). It is clear from those sources that the Nazis systematically replaced unwilling evolutionary biologists and countless other undesirable scientists with more incompetent pseudo-scientists. As long as someone had a high school degree and willingly followed Nazi ideology, he was in basically. They let this kind of person write an essay or two, and he was a scientist. The Nazis didn't care if their scientists produced bogus papers, just as long as they supported them. They re-wrote German history, distorted paleontology and archaeology, and they followed the same path in almost all areas of science. That's what happens when the education system gets subordinated to an unscientific and irrational ideology. Other Comments by black wolf
22. Comment #158117 by Noodly on April 10, 2008 at 4:55 am
There really is nothing more two-faced than a fundie blaming the holocaust on atheism. The one being, they believe, that could have intervened - didn't. Their god apparently kept out of it in order not to disturb our "free will". Even though god is so keen not to intevene, they spend many hours praying for such interventions - which are "always answered" in some form or other.
Catholics in particular should hang their heads in shame. The Vatican has only allowed extremely limited access to the relevant Nazi era documents and they clearly show that the Pope saw Hitler as a bulwark againt the atheist communists. http://www.independent.co.uk/news/europe/religion-rome-and-the-reich-the-vaticans-other-dirty-secret-479043.html
The last Pope even appointed the International Catholic-Jewish Historical Commission to put the rumours to rest, but they were stonewalled when they asked to see more archive documents and a list of 47 questions remained unanswered:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Catholic-Jewish_Historical_Commission.
Other Comments by Noodly
23. Comment #158118 by yussel123 on April 10, 2008 at 4:57 am
Comment #158117You are correct. The Pope, Pius XI, made a pact with Germany because of his fear of the Communists. He never stopped to think if perhaps the cure was worse than the disease.
Other Comments by yussel123
24. Comment #158139 by Darwin's badger on April 10, 2008 at 6:02 am
Comment #157991 by mundusvultdecipi on April 10, 2008 at 12:02 am
I am constantly amazed that there is not more of a backlash whenever the holocaust is invoked in such a cavalier manner, is it just me or does anyone else find it incredibly offensive to play fast and loose with such an horrific historical event ? We saw it invoked again, recently, with that eccentric UK bishop who thought books critical of christianity were somehow akin to holocaust denial.
My only surprise is that Stein, Mathis et al didn't attempt to pin the Cretaceous-Tertiary extinction event upon Darwin somehow. After all, if he's that evil, surely he has the ability to travel in time, wreaking havoc along the way?
Bugger, I've just remembered that they don't believe in 65 million year-old dinosaurs either. That'll be why Darwin escaped. However, I did hear that his time-travelling vehicle-of-choice was a white Fiat Uno, and he had a penchant for Parisian underpasses...
Other Comments by Darwin's badger
25. Comment #158165 by discipline on April 10, 2008 at 6:55 am
As I wrote in another thread, the dismissive, derisive comments about Expelled on this site and other science blogs are irrelevant. In the US, agnostics/atheists/secularists/scientists are a tiny band of underfunded eccentrics in comparison to the mind-boggling financial power of the Christian Right.The ID movement has hit upon a brilliant PR/marketing scheme: freedom. Check out the Discovery Institute home page, with titles like these:
"ANTI-FREEDOM ACTIVISTS TRY TO CENSOR SCIENCE EDUCATION IN FLORIDA"
This is an ingenious "re-branding" of creationism and is perfectly designed to hit Americans in their sweet spot. I predict that even moderate Christians will be swayed by the "freedom" argument. These people are genius marketers. (More evidence of this is the pro-Expelled "Beware the Believers" viral video, which fooled most on this site that it was actually pro-science!)
This film is not only outrageously offensive (exploiting the Holocaust -- wow!) but it's also very, very dangerous. Mocking it in blogs is fun but we need serious, measured, detailed responses to the film in every media outlet possible. The Shermer review is the best example of this I've seen so far.
Obviously, the "god question" was solved centuries ago -- what remains is a tactical/strategic battle.
Other Comments by discipline
26. Comment #158169 by eclampusvitus on April 10, 2008 at 6:59 am
Dr. D:I don't really keep up with movies. Could that be because I live in Hollywood?
Anyway, I learned of this film here, and have kept up with its "progress". I haven't seen it yet, of course, nor will I pay to do so, but from its own website and trailer, it's obviously dishonest.
As if your books weren't enough, this website is an important source of information. It's fun, too.
So long, and thanks for all the fish.
ECV
Other Comments by eclampusvitus
27. Comment #158170 by Daniel Palmer on April 10, 2008 at 7:00 am
However, I did hear that his time-travelling vehicle-of-choice was a white Fiat Uno, and he had a penchant for Parisian underpasses...
Ooo too soon still... isn't 22.3 years before something tragic becomes funny?
Other Comments by Daniel Palmer
28. Comment #158184 by Sossijj on April 10, 2008 at 7:32 am
The Scientific American has an interesting podcast of a discussion between the editors of the magazine and Mark Mathis, the associate producer of Expelled. Here's the link:http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=a-conversation-with-mark-mathis
Other Comments by Sossijj
29. Comment #158197 by Lucas on April 10, 2008 at 7:45 am
"In the US, agnostics/atheists/secularists/scientists are a tiny band of underfunded eccentrics in comparison to the mind-boggling financial power of the Christian Right." Discipline - Wow are you wrong about that! Take a look at the ARIS survey. Or Mark Silk's books on religion and public life. Or maybe the USA Today map I've posted several times. Do a little math. Funding aside, the number of non-believers in the US is far, far larger than Evangelical Christians. Yes, they've managed to gather more money and political influence recently, but the latter is waning big time and the former, well: How many of these folks do you think are rich? Have you been to a megachurch? Non-believers do not lack numbers or money; just organization and focus. To some degree, we are all engaged in addressing that here.
Other Comments by Lucas
30. Comment #158222 by Szymanowski on April 10, 2008 at 8:26 am
"the company was nervous that they would not have enough people in the audience so they brought in extras. Members of the audience had to sign in and a staff member reports that no more than two to three Pepperdine students were in attendance. Mr. Stein's lecture on that topic was not an event sponsored by the university." And this is one of the least dishonest parts of the film.
Golden. Even "epic fail" wouldn't do this justice.
Other Comments by Szymanowski
31. Comment #158224 by AmericanGodless on April 10, 2008 at 8:28 am
Richard -- re your Comment #158036:Of course, Kaiser is quoting (Comment #158027) -- he even gives the link.
We all are interested to hear what the real context was for the "seeded by space aliens" discussion. But we all also need to understand how this is expected to play to the intended mass audience of religious believers (if it ever reaches them, considering the copyright problems). Here's another friendly review and interview I was sent (I am on the email list for a couple of Christian groups). It includes a quote from Mark Mathis.
From http://www.tothesource.org/3_26_2008/3_26_2008.htm:
tothesource: Word is out that best-selling atheist Richard Dawkins talks himself into a corner. Could you fill us in on that?
Expelled: .. Mr. Dawkins is very well versed in his arguments against God. But something rather shocking takes place when Mr. Stein asks Mr. Dawkins about the possibility that intelligent design might be useful in the area of genetics. Mr. Dawkins responds by laying out the "intriguing possibility" that life may have come into existence elsewhere in the universe and that this unknown intelligence seeded life on earth. Mr. Stein skillfully exposes the stunning contradiction in the foundation of Mr. Dawkins's thesis. That is, Mr. Dawkins is "intrigued" about the possibility that there could be an intelligent designer in the universe, just so long as that designer isn't God. Anyone who would suggest that there is a God designer is stupid, ignorant or evil.
What's so important about this moment is that Mr. Stein doesn't just expose the double-speak of Mr. Dawkins, but also that of his fellow Darwinists. Mr. Stein exposes what's really going on in this debate. The controversy isn't about the science; it's about the atheistic, materialistic philosophy of the elitist establishment. If the Darwinists discovered evidence of an alien designer they would be giddy. If they discovered evidence of God, they would be crushed, and would do everything in their power to dismiss the evidence as fraudulent or inconclusive.
Note that the thing that amuses and astonishes the believers is that a scientist would not understand immediately that "god" is the answer to the "design problem." It would not occur to them (believers) to entertain first any possible materialistic explanations. That's why I personally dislike the "methodological naturalism" ploy used by so many of the "Neville Chamberlain school" of evolutionists. The material naturalism of science is neither a philosophy nor a methodology, but the unifying hypothesis for all of science. Of course, if we were to find the equivalent of a patent notice in the fine structure of mitochondria or chloroplasts, we would look first to find any possible material and natural patent holder, even one from outer space. But the believer says, "well, all patents belong to god the master inventor, so that settles it."
Other Comments by AmericanGodless
32. Comment #158231 by Pattern Seeker on April 10, 2008 at 8:40 am
Maybe 'FAUX NEWS' was just giving it a 'Faux Review?' Other Comments by Pattern Seeker
33. Comment #158235 by RSP on April 10, 2008 at 8:44 am
Fox News panned it?! Wow, I'm just speechless.Other Comments by RSP
34. Comment #158247 by discipline on April 10, 2008 at 8:54 am
Lucas (#158197):Yes, I admit that my views are colored by the fact that I live in the beating heart (or, as I call it, the open sore) of the Bible Belt.
The recent surveys I've seen are indeed encouraging (eg, the Pew study), but even your USA Today graphic shows that non-believers range from about 7% to 20% of the population, depending on the state. Good, but still far below European levels. Don't forget that surveys also show that 50-60% of Americans are creationists, and that's scary.
I assume that you live in the West coast or New England, so you may not realize the power that the Christian Right still holds on local and state politics and culture across the country. And the rise of Christian homeschooling promises more generations of brainwashed clones in the future (statistics here: http://www.ed.gov/about/offices/list/oii/nonpublic/statistics.html and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homeschooling#United_States)
You're right about the key question: how can US secularists/atheists organize and lobby more effectively? Thanks to the success of Richard et al., we're making progress, but it's going to be a long road...
Other Comments by discipline
35. Comment #158283 by njwong on April 10, 2008 at 9:32 am
Like the reviewers at Scientific American, I too was wondering what was the ulterior motive for the Expelled producers to give Scientific American a private screening of the film. Surely the Expelled producers would know that Scientific American would not be giving the film a positive review.
And then it dawn on me: there is no such thing as bad publicity. All publicity is good publicity.
And indeed it worked. Scientific American gave so much coverage to the film that no matter how savagely Scientific American criticises the movie, the publicity will translate to some much needed box office takings. That strategy worked brilliantly when they expelled PZ from the screening last month, generating lots of "publicity" in the media, so they are doing it again :-)
Other Comments by njwong
36. Comment #158295 by FightingFalcon on April 10, 2008 at 9:48 am
Ugh - I'm so sick and tired of hearing that Social Darwinism caused Adolf Hitler's racist beliefs.No, it didn't. Neither Hitler nor Alfred Rosenberg mention Social Darwinism in their writings. Their views on the supremacy of the Aryan race predate the idea of Social Darwinism by hundreds of years.
I'm really fed up with having to counter the same arguments over and over again. Such ignorance pisses me off.
Other Comments by FightingFalcon
37. Comment #158298 by Bigorra on April 10, 2008 at 9:50 am
In a word: Urgggh. Suddenly Stein is not so amusing anymore. I want my eye drops from someone else.
I wonder how long the people at Clear Eyes will keep Ben Stein as their spokesman? His picture is on their website, right at the top of the home page.
Other Comments by Bigorra
38. Comment #158300 by FightingFalcon on April 10, 2008 at 9:52 am
As long as someone had a high school degree and willingly followed Nazi ideology, he was in basically. They let this kind of person write an essay or two, and he was a scientist. The Nazis didn't care if their scientists produced bogus papers, just as long as they supported them. They re-wrote German history, distorted paleontology and archaeology, and they followed the same path in almost all areas of science. That's what happens when the education system gets subordinated to an unscientific and irrational ideology.
Exactly - even Himmler was a damned chicken farmer before becoming one of the most powerful men in th Reich. Hitler didn't care where you came from or what you did, so long as you carried out his policies. Probably why so many societal rejects ended up in his inner circle.
The scientific experiments carried out by the Nazis were wholly unscientific and completely insane. What kind of test is necessary to measure what happens to the human head when you add too much pressure or completely de-pressurize the room? Take a wild guess as to what will happen. Or what happens to men when you leave them outside naked in the freezing temperatures overnight.
Nazi doctors and scientists (including Hitler's personal physician) were complete quacks. Please don't associate them with the legitimate scientific community.
Other Comments by FightingFalcon
39. Comment #158309 by Diacanu on April 10, 2008 at 10:11 am
FightingFalcon-
I'm so sick and tired of hearing that Social Darwinism caused Adolf Hitler's racist beliefs.
And I'm equally sick of hearing Social Darwinism even mentioned, much less confused with Darwinism.
Social Darwinism is neither social, nor Darwinist.
It's artificial selection based on an arbitrary criteria.
Other Comments by Diacanu
40. Comment #158317 by Richard Dawkins on April 10, 2008 at 10:36 am
Comment #158024 by Richard Dawkins on April 10, 2008 at 2:09 am
Somewhere on Pharyngula recently, PZ Myers made the following excellent point. Obvious when you think about it, but it really needed to be spelled out. . . . .
I am delighted to see that the original article by PZ has now been posted on our front page. Sorry I didn't suggest that when he first wrote it.
Richard
Other Comments by Richard Dawkins
41. Comment #158329 by scrub on April 10, 2008 at 10:54 am
After following the scientific american link, I was browsing their weekly science show and they have a great post-expelled-screening interview with associate producer Mark Mathis that's absolutely humiliating:http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=a-conversation-with-mark-mathis
Deserving of it's own thread imho.
Other Comments by scrub
42. Comment #158406 by Mitchell Gilks on April 10, 2008 at 12:52 pm
Well, these guys are quite mad. You really, truly, and honestly either have to be on the bottom end of the intelligence, and/or honestly scale, to support, or buy any of this crap.
If Fox News doesn't support it, that tells me that it is even insulting to a creationists intelligence...wow.
Other Comments by Mitchell Gilks
43. Comment #158463 by Frankus1122 on April 10, 2008 at 2:51 pm
Comment #158184 by SossijjI am listening to the link now. Pricelessly brutally good.
Mathis is weasely and the Scientific American guys are dead on sharp.
I am really enjoying this.
http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=a-conversation-with-mark-mathis
Other Comments by Frankus1122
44. Comment #158471 by Darwin's badger on April 10, 2008 at 3:12 pm
Man, Mathis is a sleaze. It's ironic that the person that the religious right are happy to get behind is the very antithesis of truth and honesty. Lying for Jesus? Why the hell not. Other Comments by Darwin's badger
45. Comment #158556 by room101 on April 10, 2008 at 6:10 pm
Sossijj:Thanks for the link. Mathis is eviscerated. I'm wondering why he would ever consent to doing an interview with a room full of people a lot smarter than he is.
And don't you love Mathis's response whenever he gets cornered (which is quite often) about why his movie portrayed this or that: "I wasn't involved in the decision making process of the film.", or "I'm not a scientist."
Don't you love it when they do that? "I'm not a scientist, but..". But WHAT - You're too lazy to get your ass to a library or do any research?! If ya ain't no scientist and don't kno' nuthin, then why are you making movies and commenting on science?
What a fk'n weasel...
NOTE: I hope this podcast is made into a link on Richard's front page - It is truly deserving of it. Mathis really gets it (and he doesn't even know it).
http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=a-conversation-with-mark-mathis
Other Comments by room101
46. Comment #158566 by Teratornis on April 10, 2008 at 6:52 pm
Comment #158036 by Richard Dawkins:
The Maynard Smith kind of argument by reductio isn't really so hard to understand, unless you are as thick as Ben Stein apparently is.
Of course, but what can we expect from people who commit to unreason? It seems almost naive if one were to expect that someone whose worldview is based on a lie - namely, the claim that he knows the unknowable - would adhere to the rules of reasoned debate, or even understand them. Some theists might fight fair, but they are a minority of professional theologians who are largely out of step with the religious rank and file. A populist panderer like Ben Stein evidently isn't one of them.
Stein's mode of thinking represents a kind of intellectual fossil, increasingly anachronistic but nonetheless commonplace, vaguely analogous to the linguistic fossil of Harker's Island English, which evolved in isolation from mainland American English:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harkers_Island,_North_Carolina
In a way, Richard, you're in something like the position of an anthropologist who goes to study a newly-discovered stone age tribe. Hopefully the anthropologist does not expect the tribespeople to grasp the subtly elegant arguments that persuade and impress in the collegial confines of academia. A different kind of language is necessary in the field. (I can't claim to know what language would get through to Ben Stein, only that it must be different than anything tried thus far. Maybe Sam Harris could have a go - Sam seemed unflappable even when Bill O'Reilly had him on so Bill could spend the alloted time yelling at him.)
As I recall reading, Napolean came under criticism from his opponents for not adhering to gentlemanly customs of warfare - attacking in the rain, attacking before the opponent was ready, targeting officers, etc. Unfortunately for the opponents, there are no referees in warfare (aside from the occasional war crimes trial staged by the victors). Certainly as Darwinists we must expect the marketplace of ideas to be as ruthlessly competitive as any other marketplace, ecosystem, or military conflict.
In asymmetrical warfare, the weaker side tends to resort to more drastic and less civilized methods - suicide bombings, beheading prisoners and broadcasting the films on the Internet, deliberately targeting civilians, etc. The more disadvantaged a combatant, the more reprehensible his tactics tend to be. Non-scientists attempting to argue against scientific consensus have assumed perhaps the most intellectually disadvantaged position there is. Thus we expect them to behave with all the principled restraint of a cornered animal.
Given the overwhelming evidence supporting biological evolution and the lack of any evidence contradicting it, there seem to be only two ways to doubt it:
1. By never having heard of the evidence
2. By consciously choosing to ignore the evidence
By the time someone gets to the point of making a film attacking evolution, they are probably no longer in the first group. They must be, at that point, fully committed to dishonesty, using every available trick to distract the audience from looking at the evidence. Thus we should not be surprised when their tactics reflect their commitment to dishonesty, such as by misleading their subjects before interviews, and then by selectively editing and distorting the footage.
Other Comments by Teratornis
47. Comment #158626 by Quine on April 10, 2008 at 8:44 pm
I just finished listening to the Mathis podcast. It is worth the time, if you can stand it. As others have noted, he spends most of his time weaseling around the direct questions. Unfortunately, he does not seem to be able to understand how completely the SA staff have cut him to ribbons. Other Comments by Quine
48. Comment #158708 by mikejswalker on April 11, 2008 at 1:19 am
Listen to the Mathis Podcast (thanks Frankus).It's very revealling. He was kicked out of a place he new he'd be kicked out of to get himself kicked out, on film. Why oh why do people do these things? It's like stepping into the path of an arrow!!
Oh dear, this is a hard one to listen to. You can hear his own doubt in his own argument.
I guess to promote a film, you eventually have to go into the lions den. It's a pretty big lion in there, and the den is getting bigger all the time. I like the way the questioners keep him in the chair. 'i'm not a scientist here' he says at one point.
Quite. When the people on this site start going for it scientifically, I keep my mouth shut, and listen.
Other Comments by mikejswalker
49. Comment #158962 by mixmastergaz on April 11, 2008 at 8:53 am
Surely Hitler's irrational hatred of the Jews (and therefore, to some extent the holocaust) is accounted for more credibly by his catholicism, with its attendant charge of 'deicide' and its appaling history of anti-semitism, than by so called 'social Darwinism'.
The dishonesty of our opponents on this issue seems to know no bounds. Perhaps they're thinking:
"If we throw enough shit at the wall then some of it will stick."
Other Comments by mixmastergaz
50. Comment #158969 by Frankus1122 on April 11, 2008 at 9:07 am
Listen to the Mathis Podcast (thanks Frankus).
Thank Sossijj who first posted the link.
I am astounded by the singularity of purpose which blinds him to the truth of what he is doing.
If there is a case for Intelligent Design, make it.
As the SA guys said, that would have made a better film.
I don't think that ID has a case. It isn't even the case that they are being ignored. From what I have read all of their claims about irreducible complexity and the like have been answered. But there is a failure to see this on their part.
It is kind of like David Robertson posting on here that he has been banned from posting.
If we can hear you say, "You won't listen to us."
We've heard you. So instead of saying that tell us what your evidence of ID is.
Other Comments by Frankus1122
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1. Comment #157991 by mundusvultdecipi on April 10, 2008 at 12:02 am
I am constantly amazed that there is not more of a backlash whenever the holocaust is invoked in such a cavalier manner, is it just me or does anyone else find it incredibly offensive to play fast and loose with such an horrific historical event ? We saw it invoked again, recently, with that eccentric UK bishop who thought books critical of christianity were somehow akin to holocaust denial.Anyway - at least ONE group appears impressed by the film:
http://www.cwfa.org/articles/14984/CFI/family/index.htm
Other Comments by mundusvultdecipi