Ben Stein's 'Expelled' - Evolution, Academia and Conformity

eldavojohn writes "Painting the current scientific community as just as bad as the Spanish Inquisition, an extended trailer of Ben Stein's "Expelled" has a lot of people (at least that I know) talking. It looks like his movie plans to encourage people to speak out if they believe intelligent design or creationism to be correct. In the trailer he even warns you that if you are a scientist you may lose your job by watching 'Expelled.' Backlash to the movie has started popping up and this may force the creationism/evolutionist debate to a whole new level across the big screen and the internet." adholden points out a site called Expelled Exposed, which asserts that 'Expelled' "is simply an anti-science propaganda film aimed at creating controversy where none exists, while promoting poor science education that can and will severely handicap American students."

Not the issue...

He's missing the issue. The truth is, I believe some form of "intelligent design." But whether or not I believe it or a billion people believe it is irrelevant. Intelligent design, as has been discussed here and elsewhere, ad infinitum, it's NOT SCIENCE and should not be taught as science or as an alternative to evolution.

On the other hand, if they want to teach it in a Religious Studies type class, I'm all for it. Go for it. That's precisely where it belongs.

Re:Not the issue...

My View: by hiding the fact that other theories exist you only harm the credibility of the leading theory once the individual finds out about the other views. (as a general rule, not just to be applied to evolutionary biology / intelligent design) /damnit I fed the troll.

Your use of the term "theory" in this context shows that you have no idea what it means for something to be a scientific Theory. People who call intelligent design a "theory" are simply trying to convince your average Joe Sixpack that it is equally as plausible and on the some footing as the scientific Theory of Evolution. It is not. As far as I know, no other Theories currently exist to explain the diversity of life. No one is hiding other theories, because there aren't any. There are some fairy tales that were meant to try and explain it several thousand years ago, which in no way resemble a theory of any sort.

Academic Oppression

Its not just "Darwinists" that force their anti-Jesus dogma on the education system. I had a similar experience in my childhood.

Given a circle with a radius of 10, whats the circumference? Some would say thats its 10 * 2 * "pi"!

But what is this pi? They can't even define it;its completely irrational! Meanwhile they suppress the controversy. When I put down a much more reasonable answer - 60, because the literal Bible tells me the circumference of a circle is 2*r*3 [biblegateway.com], I was marked wrong! The Nazis used these numbers to build their war machine and concentration camps and its being taught to children far to young to understand its deceptiveness. Inquiring minds are led to a literally endless and patternless series of numbers intended to confuse and dull the mind.

Teach the controversy!

Evolution doesn't disprove God(s)... BUT...

Dawkins and many others notwithstanding, evolution doesn't disprove god(s) or mandate atheism. What it does do is undermine (very thoroughly) an argument for god(s) that used to be a 'slam dunk': the 'argument from complexity in the biological world'.

Unfortunately, a lot of people don't understand the distinction, and people like Dawkins don't help. Many religious types treat 'discounting an argument for god(s)' the same as 'advancing an argument against god(s)', and go ballistic. But it's important to note the difference. There's still room to believe in god(s) even if you accept the ridiculously overwhelming evidence that evolution happened and is happening. (I don't believe in god(s), FWIW, but many people do.)

Stein and his ilk really remind me of the worst features of Ned Flanders sometimes. "Well, I say there are some things we don't want to know! Important things!"

It isn't science.

encourage people to speak out if they believe

How many times do we have to say it, SCIENCE is not about BELIEF. You can believe whatever you want but in a science class (or academic institution) and officially (the government position) the thinking should be one of reason, evidence and demonstration of understanding. Belief has no place.

Remember if intelligent design is correct then it can be explained, demonstrated and then analysed further. Until then it is as much a waste of time as it is trying to work out how much flour Flying Spagetti Monster is made up of.

Another American obsession

This whole debate seems pretty strange to European eyes. I consider myself to be a fundamentalist Bible believing evangelical Christian, but, in Britain, people like me take the view that Genesis describes the evolutionary process pretty well. Although many Evangelicals support Intelligent Design or Young Earth Creationism, there's little opposition within Christian circles to full acceptance of the scientific explanation of the origins of life.

Between this and support for a right-wing social and foreign policy agenda, I sometimes wonder if American evangelicals read the same Bible that I do.

Sometimes

They ignore you because you obviously don't know what you're talking about.

Then they mock you because you expect to be taken seriously without putting in the work to become informed.

Then they fight you, because you won't go away until you've had your fight, and ingrained in your thinking, so deeply you don't know it's there, is the notion that might makes right.

Then you win, because there are so many ignorant, lazy, belligerent people that sooner later sensible people, who want to get something accomplished with their lives, will sooner or later give up on picking sense out of your nonsense.

So much to say...

There's so much I would like to say here, and I rather doubt that I'll get it all said, but I'll make a stab at it. In the first place, I haven't seen the movie, so can't really comment on Stein's take. However, I have looked at the "sociology" of the Evolution/Intelligent Design/Creationism debate a fair amount, and what I see disturbs me from all sides. One major concern I have is the elevation of Darwinian natural selection as a means of species creation to an unrealistic importance. I just don't see why it's so important in and of itself. One could certainly be a competent physician, for example, and not believe in Darwinism (or neo-Darwinism). It seems to me that one could even be a quite competent practitioner of any of the biological sciences (other than the various sorts of paleontology) without necessarily agreeing with Darwinism. Yet, we are constantly told that a failure to teach Darwinism at the high school level will destroy science education as we know it and result in a US population that is hopelessly ignorant of all science, etc. etc. I just don't buy it. Bluntly, I can scarcely think of a job where a belief in Darwinism is necessary. On the other hand, we have school systems that literally teach absolutely no information science, computer science, etc. etc., and people graduating from college who literally don't know the different between a byte and a gigabyte. It's hard for me to see why this ONE THING is so vitally important, when it has virtually no practical application and there are scientific topics with enormous practical application that go untaught. Could the real problem be social or (speak softly now) political? It seems to me that that is exactly the case. The extraordinary efforts put forth by various scientific bodies to defend Darwinism from all criticism strike me as a knee-jerk reaction to a knee-jerk fear that the Scope's trial will happen all over again. This isn't about science--it's about continuing the Enlightenment project of supplanting all sources of Meaning (capitalization intended) with Scientific Meaning. That doesn't mean that I think that Darwinism is wrong. I actually think that it's as right as you're going to get within the boundaries that it sets itself. But I certainly don't think that the loss of Darwinism would destroy American education or anything along those lines. So ... people... GET A GRIP. My $0.02.

The irony is thick in this one

One well known evolutionary scientist P.Z. Myers was queueing up to see a preview screening of this movie, when he was singled out of line and asked to leave the cinema [richarddawkins.net]. So he was expelled from Expelled, presumably because he would write it up for the trash it was. A double irony was he was standing next to Richard Dawkins who was apparently not recognized and allowed in.

Re:Which do you believe?

*sighs* - I bet he's skeptical about anthropomorphic climate change too

yes, the climate is beginning to look more human isn't it? i thought i was the only one who noticed.

Re:Which do you believe?

Chaos != Free Will. You said yourself (basically) that it will react in a certain way, given certain input. Just because it is too wildly changing does not mean it is not predictable; we just haven't the computing power, nor information, to make such predictions.

Of course, the same could be argued for human free will.

Re:Which do you believe?

"who's philosophy espouses striving for neutrality, lack of bias, objectivity, etc."

Having worked with a great number of scientists in my life, I would not note them for lack of bias or neutrality. In fact, I'd say scientists are noted for their strong opinions and personal bias'.

Re:Which do you believe?

Are we using the same definition of bias? Having a strong opinion is not bias, if it is a sound conclusion of the evidence. Bias is starting with the conclusion and selectively gathering the evidence to support it.

Re:Which do you believe?

It's anthropogenic climate change. Man-made, not man-like.

Perhaps climate change wants to be man made?

(seriously, thanks for the correction).

Indeed, Scientific Zealotry Hurts the Cause ...

Isn't one of the points of the movie that while scientists espouse neutrality, lack of bias, objectivity, etc. that they are not actually following it?

As one of the submitters (and evidently one of the few people who watched the extended trailer), you're pretty accurate there.

During the whole montage he's writing something over and over on the blackboard and it comes out to be something like "I will NOT question Darwinian Evolution." He interviews scientists and editors who have lost their jobs for printing/writing papers that claim our DNA has a 'code' with information that could not have happened in nature.

Disclaimer, I read a lot of Darwin/Dawkins/Gould so I'm pretty biased here ... but I fear that the ostracized members of the scientific community will make the evolutionists look just as much like religious zealots trying to purge their ranks of people with open minds. Which is why I likened his trailer to the Spanish Inquisition.

I think that even though it's 'a waste of time,' it's bad to write these people off or fire them. I'm sure there's sound criticism against these papers and authors but Ben Stein isn't showing that in his movie if there is.

If you have friends who believe in Creationism, respect them and provide for them sound arguments against it. It may be a waste of time to you but it's complete snobbery to write them off. Ben Stein is correct that you may lose friends if you watch that movie and become polarized by it--don't let that happen!

Like a Michael Moore movie, objectivity is raped, killed, gutted and donned over a rich man's face who then can safely tell you what to think.

Re:Curiosity...

Isn't one of the points of the movie that while scientists espouse neutrality, lack of bias, objectivity, etc. that they are not actually following it?

Actually, this is just Ben Stein's great way of capitalizing on fears and preconceptions of the population. He literally produced a film that caters to the ignorant and the blindly faithful... without even a shred of evidence that he himself believes it.

The movie will do great harm to the already eroded image of science and scientists in the U.S., despite presenting very flimsy evidence in the Michael Moore style of film-making (i.e. gross misrepresentations, half-truths, and outright lies, sprinkled with a dose of misplaced truth to prevent it from being rejected outright).

Stein actually told the people he interviewed for the movie that he was making a completely different film (philosophy, I think). This is grossly unethical, but par for the course for current media. Frankly, I just didn't expect Stein to follow suit.

As a scientist who believes in God, I am appalled at this film, and I think Stein should be ashamed of himself. Maybe if not for asshole exercises such as this, people would calm down and realize that unless you take religious texts literally, they address questions that are incompatible with science, and thus cannot possibly be in conflict with the latter.

RDS = Re-Direct Script!

Don't click on links ending with notlong.com! http://rds.yahoo.com/_ylt [yahoo.com] ...

More importantly it's that beginning 'rds' that is a dead giveaway. That's Yahoo hosting a Re-Direct Script (RDS). If you see [yahoo.com] after a link, fair warning that you should check the very beginning, they could be hosting a redirect to something very very harmful. Honestly, I'm shocked that Yahoo would do that but I guess what ever brings in the ad/referral cash, huh?

Re:Controversy?

Meh... As long as both are prefixed with "theory of", who cares?

Um... because evolution can be observed, and any rational mind can understand the mechanisms by which it works, and the magic-man-in-the-sky "theory" make no provision for testing, cannot be evaluated as anything other than wishful thinking, and teaches kids not to engage in critical thinking.

Your willingness to tolerate creationism in school as long as they call it a theory is actually worse than the delusions of the people who put it forward in the first place, because - by themselves - they come across as ignorant loons. You're giving them credibility.

Re:Monkey's uncle?

Why do people automatically assume Evolution is true just because they don't understand what other theories actually mean?

Because the evidence [talkorigins.org] for evolution is overwhelming [talkorigins.org]?

Re:Monkey's uncle?

Why do people automatically assume Evolution is true just because they don't understand what other theories actually mean?

People do not automatically assume evolution is true. It is a well tested theory that provides a good explanation for the word and has made good and testable predictions. It does not explain everything and does not claim to and is working to find the answers. Intelligent Design (or as Christopher Hitchens has referred to it Ignorance Deified.) is not even a theory and provides not useful understanding in how life works. If the ID people want to be taken seriously. They can produce good research and put forward a good testable hypothesis that can better explain the world or the liars for Jesus can just STFU. Why do people assume a completely untested assertion is a legitimate competitor in the marketplace of ideas?

Re:Monkey's uncle?

Uh... because there is exactly zero evidence supporting other theories? Because other theories are largely unscientific, untestable, and not falsifiable? Because creationists still don't understand that evidence against one theory do NOT automatically equate to support for an alternate theory*? Because evidence from every branch of science, from astronomy to chemistry to geology to physics to zoology all support the currently accepted theory? You know, those sorts of things kind of tend to make people really, really tired of dealing with folks like Ben Stein, who remain obstinately and willfully ignorant.

(*e.g., if this fruit is not an orange, that does not mean it is automatically an apple... heck, could be a kumquat, for all you know).

What other theories?

Why do people automatically assume Evolution is true just because they don't understand what other theories actually mean?

Which other theories? Nobody has presented any other theory at all.

In order for something to be a theory, it must be testable and falsifiable. "My invisible friend did it" is *not* a theory.

Re:One point...

Except there is a discussion in academia, Ben Stein just doesn't like the outcome of that debate so he claims it's "unfair". Scientific debate isn't the Skull and Bones society, anybody can join in if they have some good points to make and some good arguments to back them up. All I ever hear from folks like Ben Stein is how they are being unfairly excluded from the debate...yet rarely have I actually seen them making any attempt to join in. Since this is Slashdot, I can't end this post without an analogy...so here goes. Forget we're talking about science and think about the place where you work. Imagine there is someone who shows up late, leaves early and doesn't get a lot done while he's there. Now imagine that person spends basically all his time at the office complaining that it's unfair how he's not getting promoted and that the boss has it in for him. That's how I feel about Ben Stein here.

An honest question for the young-Earth types.

Finding oil is a very important and high-stakes issue for oil companies. Literally trillions of dollars are riding on it. Exxon's exploration budget alone is around $20 billion per year. When the chips are down and they need to find the most likely spots to drill - what kind of geology do they use? Flood geology, or mainstream? Which one actually delivers the goods?

Let's assume the Earth is only a few thousand years old. Where did the oil come from? Was it created in the ground with the rest of the Earth? If so, is there a way to predict where it might be found? Or perhaps it really did form from plankton (with a few plants and dinosaurs), but about 10,000 times faster than any chemist believes it could? Any way you look at it, a young Earth and a Flood would imply some very interesting scientific questions to ask, some interesting (and potentially extremely valuable) research programs to start. How come nobody's actually pursuing such research programs?

Why don't creationists put together an investment fund, where people pay in and the stake is used as venture capital for things like oil and mineral rights? If "Flood geology" is really a better theory, then it should make better predictions about where raw materials are than standard geology does. The profits from such a venture could pay for a lot of evangelism. Why isn't anyone doing this?

Re:Who the hell is Ben Stein ...

I don't agree with this. Ben Stein's opinions aren't worthless because he's not a scientist - they're wrong because they just don't have the necessary support.