My husband and I just got to see the not yet released movie Expelled. It was the director's cut (meaning 85% finalized) and the producer was present. This movie is about academic freedom. It talked about how many scientists are fired, censored, etc. for dissenting on Darwinism. But the movie also goes deeper, and deals with the social issues that arise when cultures embrace Darwinism. It is a great conversation starter. I hope everyone will go see it when it comes out in April.
BTW, this is one more reason to support Huckabee. He hasn't bought into all of the Darwin bull corn and the social ills that arise from it.
7 comments:
"It talked about how many scientists are fired, censored, etc. for dissenting on Darwinism."
But that assertion is a lie. No one was ever fired or censored. But I'm not sure what "etc" is supposed to cover.
The person that was "forced to resign" was the Director of Science for the Texas Education Agency. She was forced to resign by creationists.
Anonymous,
That's odd. They interviewed several scientists that had been fired and or censored. Some had not been fired outright, but were denied tenure, or were refused grants. Hence the etc.
I am not aware of the case that you mentioned, but would find it interesting.
I got a message saying google Chris Comer that I rejected, but here is what wikipedia says about her.
Comer was "forced out"[1] of her TEA position following recommendations by TEA officials for "repeated acts of misconduct and insubordination", but Comer and others believe that she was targeted based on religious concerns and the teaching of creationism in Texas public schools.[4][5][6]
On October 26, 2007,[7] Comer forwarded to a local online community an email message[8] from the National Center for Science Education promoting a November 2, 2007, talk by Barbara Forrest in Austin, Texas. Forrest is a professor of philosophy at Southeastern Louisiana University who served as an expert witness in the Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District trial, the 2005 landmark evolution-intelligent design court battle in Dover, Pennsylvania, and co-authored the book Creationism's Trojan Horse: The Wedge of Intelligent Design.[1]
The call to fire Comer came from Lizzette Reynolds, deputy commissioner for statewide policy and programs.[4] Reynolds, who has a degree in political science and has no teaching experience, joined the TEA in January, 2007. Reynolds previously worked for a Texas state senator, as a lobbyist, as deputy legislative director for former Texas Governor George W. Bush, and in the U.S. Department of Education.[9] In an email to Comer's supervisors, Reynolds called the email "highly inappropriate" and "an offense that calls for termination or, at the very least, reassignment of responsibilities."[4] Reynolds has subsequently backtracked, expressing her surprise over Comer's resignation to The Austin American-Statesman.[10]
Shortly after sending the email, Comer was placed on administrative leave. Agency official Monica Martinez cited the e-mail in a memo[11] recommending her termination, stating, among other complaints, that "Ms. Comer's e-mail implies endorsement of the speaker and implies that TEA endorses the speaker's position on a subject on which the agency must remain neutral."[4]
The TEA is scheduled to review, and possibly revise, its science curriculum in 2008. Some evolution proponents worry that politicization of the TEA may increase the influence of those lobbying for teaching of creationism and intelligent design.[12] The issue is compounded by the recent appointment of Don McLeroy as chairman of the Texas State Board of Education. McLeroy has made past comments supporting the teaching of creationism[4] and intelligent design.[1]
Intelligent Design is, emphatically, NOT science. It is a perverse reinterpretation of poorly recorded evidence and blatant lies, at the service of ideology (instead of facts).
Thus, if an educational institution is in the business of teaching SCIENCE, intelligent design is automatically out of the curriculum.
I would like to work in Aruba: I like the sun and the beach. I work in one of the top 20 universities in the world, and usually the weather is dismal. Should I bitch and whine that I can't have both? Or should I weigh what is more important to me, and act accordingly?
ID is not good science - it is, in the worst case, pseudoscience, or in the best case scenario, poor science that does not withstand peer review. Adherents to ID can choose: either they transform ID in high quality science (impossible, in my mind) or they move to the departments of theology and philosophy.
Anonymous,
Technically none of the origins theories are scientific because they are not observable or measurable.
There are some things that are observable. For example, after Mount St. Helen's erupted many sedmintary layers of rock where laid down in a matter of hours or days (not millions of years). Observable mutations are almost always a negative for the organism. The featherless chicken and the six legged frog are at a disadvantage. These things are science as they can be documented.
"Technically none of the origins theories are scientific because they are not observable or measurable."
Obviously your definition of "scientific theory" is incomplete. Science explains things with natural explanations. A natural effect must have a natural cause. So any observation must be explained by an appropriate scientific theory. The DNA "tree of life" is an obvious observation and evolution is the obvious scientific theory that explains that observation. Any "origin theory" that is natural is therefore scientific. It might not be plausible or it might be wrong, but it would be scientific.
"erupted many sedimentary layers of rock were laid down in a matter of hours or days (not millions of years).
And this proves that that is possible. But it proves nothing about other observations of sedimentary rocks in extremely uniform layers over hundreds of thousands of square miles. A volcanic or flood explanation would be "natural", but also ridiculous.
"These things are science as they can be documented."
Your silly opinions are irrelevant.
onein6billion,
Our worldviews are too different to really continue this conversation. I believe in the supernatural. It makes a lot more sense to me to believe that an intelligent God spoke the universe into being than to believe that everything evolved from hydrogen gas and that at some point non-living gave rise to living.
With this in mind, I don't think that I will publish any more of your comments about creation/evolution or the Expelled movie. This is not a forum for debates. It is just my blog.
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