By now, you may have heard of 'Expelled', a documentary film from one of my favorite people, Ben Stein.
This film deals with the touchy issue of creation vs. evolution, but, before you run away, let me tell you what this film is and what it is not.
What this film is not:
As far as I can tell from the trailers, this film is not, primarily, a defense of creationism or an attack on evolutionism. While these issues will, at some point, have to be a part of any discussion in this arena, it appears that this film has greater scope than simply feeding this debate.
What this film is:
Why can't anyone believe that God created the universe without being shunned? Why are creationist scientists denied tenure and ridiculed by their peers? Why can't we disagree on this issue and still get along? Ben Stein is investigating the lives of scientists and professors who aren't allowed to think outside the box.
Galileo faced the Inquisition because of his promotion of the Copernican view of the Solar System. Everyone regards this as a terrible crime, so why do non-believers feel they can justify such hatred against their colleagues, today?
There is a certain popular religion (which I will not name at this point) that teaches that the Earth is shaped like a triangle. A primary text from another popular religion (that many world leaders today are using to rule their countries) tells us that Genies populate the Earth. No one is attacking these high-profile religions for their non-scientific claims, but anyone claiming that the Universe was created by someone is completely shunned. How about a little tolerance?
2 comments:
Hi, I like the post and am really looking forward to the film, but I wanted to make a couple of points. (please pardon my horrible grammar and probably spelling.) The full title is "Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed" which hints at it's dealing with "Intelligent Design" as opposed to what creationism is commonly thought of. Basically ID proponents will often try to make the point that unlike creationism ID doesn't start from a religious text and show how science fits the text, and that ID is neutral on who the designer might be (It is commonly defined as something along the lines of: the study of patterns and systems in nature that are best explained by an intelligent cause as opposed an undirected process such as natural selection.) Opponents argue it is creationism in disguise trying to sneak itself into the classroom where it seems to be against the law I guess to do so at the moment. (although the leading ID think tank "Discovery Institute" at the moment just wants evolution to be taught with both its strengths and weaknesses).
Also just thought I'd throw in that a lot of what is believed about the Galileo story seems to be untrue, I really liked the chapter on it in "What's So Great About Christianity" by Dinesh D'souza. An example is that he wasn't executed, and he thought the chief source of his problems was that he had made fun of the pope. - The really large brother of a friend of yours’ not too long ago wedding. Hope I used the correct HTML. Cool blog.
Oh, and the film's new release date since Feb 12 darwin day didn't work out seems to be April 18! The day right before the day darwin died.
Post a Comment