Thread: "Expelled" : Ben Stein Vs. Sputtering Atheists

Ben Stein Vs. Sputtering Atheists
Fri Apr 18, 3:00 AM ET

I confess that when the producers of Ben Stein's new documentary "Expelled" called, offering me a private screening, I was less than excited.

It is a reality of PC liberalism: There is only one credible side to an issue, and any dissent is not only rejected, it is scorned. Global warming. Gay "rights." Abortion "rights." On these and so many other issues there is enlightenment, and then there is the Idiotic Other Side. PC liberalism's power centers are the news media, the entertainment industry and academia, and all are in the clutches of an unmistakable hypocrisy: Theirs is an ideology that preaches the freedom of thought and expression at every opportunity, yet practices absolute intolerance toward dissension.

Evolution is another one of those one-sided debates. We know the concept of Intelligent Design is stifled in academic circles. An entire documentary to state the obvious? You can see my reluctance to view it.

I went into the screening bored. I came out of it stunned.

Ben Stein's extraordinary presentation documents how the worlds of science and academia not only crush debate on the origins of life, but also crush the careers of professors who dare to question the Darwinian hypothesis of evolution and natural selection.

Stein asks a simple question: What if the universe began with an intelligent designer, a designer named God? He assembles a stable of academics — experts all — who dared to question Darwinist assumptions and found themselves "expelled" from intellectual discourse as a result. They include evolutionary biologist Richard Sternberg (sandbagged at the Smithsonian), biology professor Caroline Crocker (drummed out of George Mason University), and astrophysicist Guillermo Gonzalez (blackballed at Iowa State University).

That's disturbing enough, but what Stein does next is truly shocking. He allows the principal advocates of Darwinism to speak their minds. These are experts with national reputations, regular welcomed guests on network television and the like. But the public knows them only by their careful seven-second soundbites. Stein engages them in conversation. They speak their minds. They become sputtering ranters, openly championing their sheer hatred of religion.

PC liberalism has showered accolades on atheist author Richard Dawkins' best-selling book "The God Delusion" But when Stein suggests to Dawkins that he's been critical of the Old Testament God, Dawkins protests — not that Stein is wrong, but that he's being too mild. He then reads from this jaw-dropping paragraph of his book:

"The God of the Old Testament is arguably the most unpleasant character in all fiction: jealous and proud of it; a petty, unjust, unforgiving control freak; a vindictive, bloodthirsty ethnic cleanser; a misogynistic, homophobic, racist, infanticidal, genocidal, filicidal, pestilential, megalomaniacal, sadomasochistic, capriciously malevolent bully."

Dawkins has a website. Its slogan is "A clear-thinking oasis."

It's understood that God had nothing to do with the origins of life on Earth. What, then, is the alternate explanation? Stein asks these experts, and their very serious answers are priceless. One theorizes that life began somehow on the backs of crystals. Another states electric sparks from a lightning storm created organic matter (out of nothing). Another declares that life was brought to Earth by aliens. Anything but God.

The most controversial part of the film follows Stein to the Dachau concentration camp, underlining how Darwin's theories of natural selection led to the eugenics movement, embraced by Adolf Hitler. If there is no God, but only a planetary lab waiting for scientists to perfect the human race, where can Darwinism lead? Stein insists that he isn't accusing today's Darwinists of Nazism. He points out, however, that Hitler's mad science was inspired by Darwinism.

Now that the film is complete, the evolutionist prophets featured in the film are on the warpath inveighing against it, and the alleged idiots who would lower themselves to watching it. Richard Dawkins laments how the film will solicit "cheap laughs that could only be raised in an audience of scientific ignoramuses." Minnesota professor and blogger P.Z. Myers predicts the movie is "going to appeal strongly to the religious, the paranoid, the conspiracy theorists, and the ignorant —— which means they're going to draw in about 90 percent of the American market." Myers and Dawkins now both complain they were "duped" into appearing in the movie (for pay).

Everyone should take the opportunity to see "Expelled" — if nothing else, as a bracing antidote to the atheism-friendly culture of PC liberalism. But it's far more than that. It's a spotlight on the arrogance of this movement and its leaders, a spotlight on the choking intolerance of academia, and a spotlight on the ignorance of so many who say so much, yet know so very little.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/uc/20080418/...ctf2V37PKs0NUE

Another declares that life was brought to Earth by aliens. Anything but God.

Yoko Ono sues "Expelled" filmmakers over 'Imagine'
26 minutes ago

NEW YORK (Reuters) - John Lennon's widow, Yoko Ono, and his sons are suing the filmmakers of "Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed" for using the song "Imagine" in the documentary without permission.

Lennon recorded the song in 1971 and in 2004, Rolling Stone magazine ranked it No. 3, in their 500 Greatest Songs of All Time, according to the lawsuit.

Yoko Ono, son, Sean Ono Lennon, and Julian Lennon, John Lennon's son from his first marriage, along with privately held publisher EMI Blackwood Music Inc filed suit in U.S. District Court in Manhattan seeking to bar the filmmakers and their distributors from continuing to use "Imagine" in the movie.

They are also seeking unspecified damages.

The documentary, which features Ben Stein, an actor, comedian and former speechwriter for President Richard Nixon, looks at alleged discrimination against scientists and teachers who support so-called intelligent design as an alternative to Darwin's theory of evolution.

The suit is against the film's producers and distributors: Premise Media Corporation, C&S Production, LP and Rocky Mountain Pictures.

The three companies did not respond to requests for comment.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20080423/...0WrTms6U1xFb8C

Ben Stein Provokes the Liberal Wrath
By Phyllis Schlafly

Ben Stein is known to many as an actor on Comedy Central. But the funniest part about his recent movie "Expelled" is not any clever lines spoken by Stein but the hysterical way liberals are trying to discourage people from seeing it.

Stein's critics fail to effectively refute anything in "Expelled"; they just use epithets to ridicule it and hope they can make it go away. However, it won't go away; even Scientific American, which labeled the movie "shameful," concedes that it cannot be ignored.

The movie is about how scientists who dare to criticize Darwinism or discuss the contrary theory called intelligent design are expelled, fired, denied tenure, blacklisted, and bitterly denounced. Academic freedom doesn't extend to this issue.

The message of Stein's critics comes through loud and clear. They don't want anybody to challenge Darwinian orthodoxy or suggest that intelligent design might be an explanation of the origin of life.

Stein, who serves as his own narrator in the movie, is very deadpan about it all. He doesn't try to convince the audience that Darwinism is a fraud, or that God created the world, or even that some unidentified intelligent design might have started life on Earth. Stein merely shows the intolerance of the universities, the government, the courts, the grant-making foundations and the media, and their determination to suppress any mention of intelligent design.

The only question posed by the movie is why, oh why, is there such a deliberate, consistent, widespread, vindictive effort to silence all criticism of dogmatic Darwinism or discussion of alternate theories of the origin of life? Stein interviews scientists who were blacklisted, denied grants and ostracized in the academic community because they dared to write or speak the forbidden words.

Liberals are particularly upset because the movie identifies Darwinism, rather than evolution, as the sacred word that must be isolated from criticism. But that semantic choice makes good sense because Darwinism is easily defined by Darwin's own writings, whereas the word evolution is subject to different and even contrary definitions.

The truly funny part of the movie is Stein's interview with Richard Dawkins, whose best-selling book "The God Delusion" (Mariner Books, $15.95) established this Englishman as the world's premier atheist. Dawkins is a leading advocate of the theory that all life evolved from a single beginning in an ancient mud puddle, perhaps after being struck by lightning.

Putting aside the issue of evolving, how did life begin in the first place? Under Stein's questioning, Dawkins finally said it is possible that life might have evolved on Earth after the arrival of a more highly developed being from another planet. Aren't aliens from outer space the stuff of science fiction? And how was the other-planet alien created? According to Dawkins, life must have just spontaneously evolved on another planet, of course without God.

Stein spent two years traveling the world to gather material for this movie. He interviewed scores of scientists and academics who say they were retaliated against because of questioning Darwin's theories. Stein interviewed Dr. Richard Sternberg, a biologist who lost his position at the prestigious Smithsonian Institution after he published a peer-reviewed article that mentioned intelligent design. Other academics who said they were victims of the anti-intelligent design campus police included astrobiologist Guillermo Gonzalez, denied tenure at Iowa State University, and Caroline Crocker, who lost her professorship at George Mason University.

Stein dares to include some filming at the death camps in Nazi Germany as a backdrop for interviews that explain Darwin's considerable influence on Adolf Hitler and his well-known atrocities. The Darwin-Hitler connection was not a Stein discovery; Darwin's influence on Hitler's political worldview, and Hitler's rejection of the sacredness of human life, is acknowledged in standard biographies of Hitler.

Stein also addresses how Darwin's theories influenced one of the U.S.'s most embarrassing periods, the eugenics fad of the early 20th century. Thousands of Americans were legally sterilized as physically or mentally unfit. Mandatory sterilization based on Darwin's theories was even approved by the U.S. Supreme Court, with Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes writing his famous line, "Three generations of imbeciles are enough." Stein also reminds us that Margaret Sanger, founder of Planned Parenthood, was a eugenicist who wanted to eliminate the races she believed were inferior.

Stein's message is that the attack on freedom of inquiry is anti-science, anti-American, and anti-the whole concept of learning. His dramatization should force the public, and maybe even academia, to address this extraordinary intolerance of diversity

Proof of Evolution ??


Scientists map the genetic makeup of the platypus
By ROHAN SULLIVAN, Associated Press Writer
Thu May 8, 6:34 PM ET

SYDNEY, Australia - With a bill like a duck, a tail like a beaver and snake-like venom hidden in heel spurs, the platypus could be the result of some strange genetic experiment.

And it is, scientists say: evolution.

A scientific team published the genetic makeup of the Australian animal in the scientific journal Nature on Thursday, confirming that its features — which straddle multiple animal classes — are reflected in its DNA.

The research could help explain how mammals, including humans, evolved from reptiles millions of years ago, they said. "At first glance, the platypus appears as if it was the result of an evolutionary accident," said Francis S. Collins, director of the U.S. National Human Genome Research Institute, which funded the study. "But as weird as this animal looks, its genome sequence is priceless for understanding how mammalian biological processes evolved," Collins said in a statement.

More than 100 scientists from the United States, Australia, Japan and other nations took part in mapping the genome, using DNA collected from a female platypus named Glennie.

Jenny Graves, an Australian National University genomics expert who co-wrote the paper, said the gene sequencing shows the platypus has a mix that crosses different classifications of animals. "What we found was the genome, just like the animal, is an amazing amalgam of reptilian and mammal characteristics with quite a few unique platypus characteristics as well," she told Australian Broadcasting Corp.

The platypus is classed as a mammal because it has fur and feeds its young with milk. But it also has bird and reptile features — it lays eggs, has a duck-like bill and webbed feet, it and lives mostly underwater. Males also have spurs on their heels that inject pain-causing venom to ward off mating rivals.

Scientists believe the platypus and humans shared an evolutionary path until about 165 million years ago when the platypus branched off. Unlike other evolving mammals, the platypus retained characteristics of snakes and lizards, Graves said.

By comparing platypus genes to those of humans and other mammals, scientists hope to fill in the gaps about mammals' evolution and better identify species' specific traits.

Unique to Australia, the platypus has confounded observers for centuries. Aboriginal legend explained the notoriously shy animal as the offspring of a duck and an amorous water rat.

When the British Museum received its first specimen in 1798, zoologist George Shaw was so dubious he tried to cut the pelt with scissors to make sure the bill had not been stitched on by a taxidermist.

Platypuses live along most of Australia's east coast and though their numbers are not accurately known they are not considered to be endangered.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080508/...ZFxKmkaQ2s0NUE



Neither fish nor fowl : Platypus genome decoded
by Marlowe Hood
Thu May 8, 8:51 AM ET

PARIS (AFP) - Arguably the oddest beast in Nature's menagerie, the platypus looks as it if were assembled from spare parts left over after the animal kingdom was otherwise complete.

Now scientists know why. According to a study released Wednesday, the egg-laying critter is a genetic potpourri -- part bird, part reptile and part lactating mammal.

The task of laying bare the platypus genome of 2.2 billion base pairs spread across 18,500 genes has taken several years, but will do far more than satisfy the curiosity of just biologists, say the researchers.

"The platypus genome is extremely important, because it is the missing link in our understanding of how we and other mammals first evolved," explained Oxford University's Chris Ponting, one of the study's architects.

"This is our ticket back in time to when all mammals laid eggs while suckling their young on milk."

Native to eastern Australia and Tasmania, the semi-aquatic platypus is thought to have split off from a common ancestor shared with humans approximately 170 million years ago.

The creature is so strange that when the first stuffed specimens arrived in Europe at the end of the 18th century, biologists believed they were looking at a taxidermist's hoax, a composite stitched together from the body of a beaver and the snout of a giant duck.

But the peculiar mix of body features are clearly reflected in the animal's DNA, the study found.

The platypus is classified as a mammal because it produces milk and is covered in coat of thick fur, once prized by hunters.

Lacking teats, the female nurses pups through the skin covering its abdomen.

But there are reptile-like attributes too: females lay eggs, and males can stab aggressors with a snake-like venom that flows from a spur tucked under its hind feet.

The bird-like qualities implied by its Latin name, Ornithorhynchus anatinus, include webbed feet, a flat bill similar to a duck's, and the gene sequences that determine sex. Whereas humans have two sex chromosomes, platypuses have 10, the study showed.

"It is much more of a melange than anyone expected," commented Ewan Birney, who led the genome analysis at the European Bioinformatics Institute in Cambridge.

The animal also possesses a feature unique to monotremes -- an order including a handful of egg-laying mammals -- called electroreception.

With their eyes, ears and nostrils closed, platypuses rely on sensitive electrosensory receptors tucked inside their bills to track prey underwater, detecting electrical fields generated by muscular contraction.

"By comparing the platypus genome to other mammalian genomes, we'll be able to study genes that have been conserved throughout evolution," said senior author Richard Wilson, a researcher at Washington University.

In captivity, platypuses have lived up to 17 years of age.

In the wild, they feed on worms, insect larvae, shrimps and crayfish, eating up to 20 percent of their body weight every day.

Males grow to a length of 50 centimetres (20 inches) and weigh about two kilos (4.5 pounds), with females about 20 percent shorter and lighter.

The genome sequenced for the study belongs to a female specimen from New South Wales nicknamed Glennie and can be accessed at www.ncbi.nih.gov/Genbank.

http://real-us.news.yahoo.com/s/afp/...s_080508125127


... Or proof that God has a sense of humor ?

I have always liked Ben Stein... he is an extremely intelligent man.

NY judge: Film can use John Lennon song
By TOM HAYS, Associated Press Writer
10 minutes ago

NEW YORK - Yoko Ono lost her legal bid Monday to stop the playing of a 15-second excerpt of John Lennon's song "Imagine" in a film challenging the theory of evolution. Lennon's widow had sued the makers of "Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed," saying they used the ex-Beatle's anthem without her permission.

Ono, who had sought a preliminary injunction before the movie gets a wider release, said she would appeal. The other plaintiffs were Lennon's sons, Sean and Julian. U.S. District Judge Sidney Stein ruled that if the case went to court, the filmmakers would probably win under the fair use doctrine. "That doctrine provides that the fair use of a copyrighted work for the purposes of criticism and commentary is not an infringement of copyright," Stein wrote in his decision in Manhattan federal court.

Ono said in a statement, "It is a pity that this decision weakens the rights of all copyright owners."

The defendants, Premise Media Corp. of Dallas, Rampant Films of Sherman Oaks, Calif., and Rocky Mountain Pictures Inc. of Salt Lake City, said they were pleased. "There were important free-speech issues here — they were literally asking the judge to censor the film," said their lawyer, Anthony T. Falzone.

The movie, which opened on U.S. screens in April and is set for release in Canada later this month and on DVD in October, presents a sympathetic view of intelligent design, the theory that the universe is too complex to be explained by evolution alone.

At a hearing last month, Falzone had argued that the segment of the song in the film — "nothing to kill or die for, and no religion too" — was central to the movie because "it represents the most popular and persuasive embodiment of this viewpoint that the world is better off without religion."

The film, he said, is "asking if John Lennon was right and it's concluding he was wrong."

Ono had countered by saying, "One of the most basic rights I control by reviewing and choosing licenses is the right to say `no.' The filmmakers simply looted me of the ability to do so."

The film features Ben Stein (no relation to the judge), an actor and former speechwriter for Presidents Nixon and Ford, defending intelligent design.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080602/...tqlS0pMb7qChkF

6/111

US churches to discuss evolution vs creation
By DIONNE WALKER, AP Writer
22 mins ago

ATLANTA – After a lifetime in the church, the Rev. William L. Rhines Jr. lately has started to question one of the Bible's fundamental teachings, that God created man.

It's an especially touchy topic in his Wilmington, Del., congregation, where generations of black worshippers have leaned on faith to endure the indignities of racism.

But as the world marked the 200th birthday of evolution theorist Charles Darwin on Thursday, Rhines figures its time for even the most conservative congregations to come to terms with science.

"We're becoming more middle class, upper middle class, so we have more free time ... to ponder these eternal issues," said Rhines, who will encourage a discussion at Ezion-Mt. Carmel United Methodist Church.

Hundreds of churches this week will revisit the question of whether man evolved from lower order species or was created whole by a higher being as part of Evolution Weekend.

Participation through sermons, Sunday school lessons and even evolution dances has expanded into 974 congregations across the country, more than doubling since the weekend began in 2006, said founder Michael Zimmerman, dean of the college of liberal arts and sciences at Butler University in Indianapolis.

Organizers said the churches include a growing number of conservative groups, among them black and Muslim groups typically linked to more traditional views.

Participants say they're not abandoning the Bible's story of Adam and Eve. Rather, they want to blend theories in a way that helps today's faithful reconcile their modern world with Biblical teachings.

"We have to give God a lot more credit than we give him now — we need to give him the benefit of the doubt that his word includes evolution," said Mike Ghouse, president of the World Muslim Congress, a Dallas-based union of 3,000 Muslims that hosted its first ever Evolution Weekend discussion Friday.

The evolution vs. creation debate has simmered for at least the last 150 years since Darwin's "On the Origin of Species." That volume first suggested populations evolve over generations through a process of natural selection.

Zimmerman argues the faithful can accept parts of creationism — the notion that a higher being created man whole — and evolution.

"Faith is related to one's belief system ... science, on the other hand, is in a different domain," said the Rev. Gerald Kersey, who planned a Sunday school lesson and discussion of Darwin's theories at Avondale Estates First Baptist Church in suburban Atlanta.

He blamed religious intolerance for causing many faithful to feel they must choose between science and the Bible.

"I'm presenting the idea that science or evolution is compatible with faith," he said.

Still, many Americans believe that God created man. A 2006 survey by the Pew Research Center's Forum on Religion and Public Life found 63 percent of Americans believed humans and other animals have either always existed in their present form or have evolved over time under the guidance of a supreme being.

That percentage is especially high among the nation's black churchgoers, who have been taught for generations to cope with everything from slavery to Jim Crow by using the Bible's teachings, Rhines said.

"We don't want to tamper with what grandma taught us — we've come this far by faith," Rhines said.

At one of the nation's oldest black churches, the First African Baptist Church in Savannah, Ga., the Rev. Thurmond Tillman doesn't oppose evolution.

But he argued black Americans have other social issues to address, and the faithful should focus on uniting mankind — not dividing his origins.

"What we're judged on his how we first relate with Him," Tillman said. "And the test of how we relate with Him is how we relate with one another."

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090213/...lution_weekend

On the Net:

Evolution Weekend, http://www.butler.edu/clergyproject/...ol_weekend.htm

Atheist 'mega-churches' take root across US, world
[I]Hundreds of atheists have been drawn to Sunday Assembly gatherings as a way to meet likeminded people in a landscape dominated by faith.
1 day ago |By Gillian Flaccus of Associated Press

Attendees sing a song at the Sunday Assembly, a godless congregation, on Sunday, Nov. 10, in Los Angeles.

LOS ANGELES — It looked like a typical Sunday morning at any mega-church. Hundreds packed in for more than an hour of rousing music, an inspirational sermon, a reading and some quiet reflection. The only thing missing was God.

Dozens of gatherings dubbed "atheist mega-churches" by supporters and detractors are springing up around the U.S. after finding success in Great Britain earlier this year. The movement fueled by social media and spearheaded by two prominent British comedians is no joke.

On Sunday, the inaugural Sunday Assembly in Los Angeles attracted more than 400 attendees, all bound by their belief in non-belief. Similar gatherings in San Diego, Nashville, New York and other U.S. cities have drawn hundreds of atheists seeking the camaraderie of a congregation without religion or ritual.

The founders, British duo Sanderson Jones and Pippa Evans, are currently on a tongue-in-cheek "40 Dates, 40 Nights" tour around the U.S. and Australia to drum up donations and help launch dozens of Sunday Assemblies. They hope to raise more than $800,000 that will help atheists launch their pop-up congregations around the world.

They don't bash believers but want to find a new way to meet likeminded people, engage in the community and make their presence more visible in a landscape dominated by faith.

Jones got the first inkling for the idea while leaving a Christmas concert six years ago. "There was so much about it that I loved, but it's a shame because at the heart of it, it's something I don't believe in," Jones said. "If you think about church, there's very little that's bad. It's singing awesome songs, hearing interesting talks, thinking about improving yourself and helping other people — and doing that in a community with wonderful relationships. What part of that is not to like?"

The movement dovetails with new studies showing an increasing number of Americans are drifting from any religious affiliation.

The Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life released a study last year that found 20 percent of Americans say they have no religious affiliation, an increase from 15 percent in the last five years. Pew researchers stressed, however, that the category also encompassed majorities of people who said they believed in God but had no ties with organized religion and people who consider themselves "spiritual" but not "religious."

Sunday Assembly — whose motto is Live Better, Help Often, Wonder More — taps into that universe of people who left their faith but now miss the community church provided, said Phil Zuckerman, a professor of secular studies at Pitzer College in Claremont.

It also plays into a feeling among some atheists that they should make themselves more visible. For example, last December, an atheist in Santa Monica created an uproar — and triggered a lawsuit — when he set up a godless display amid Christian nativity scenes that were part of a beloved, decades-old tradition. "In the U.S., there's a little bit of a feeling that if you're not religious, you're not patriotic. I think a lot of secular people say, 'Hey, wait a minute. We are charitable, we are good people, we're good parents and we are just as good citizens as you and we're going to start a church to prove it," said Zuckerman. "It's still a minority, but there's enough of them now."

That impulse, however, has raised the ire of those who have spent years pushing back against the idea that atheism itself is a religion. "The idea that you're building an entire organization based on what you don't believe, to me, sounds like an offense against sensibility," said Michael Luciano, a self-described atheist who was raised Roman Catholic but left when he became disillusioned. "There's something not OK with appropriating all of this religious language, imagery and ritual for atheism."

That sentiment didn't seem to detract from the excitement Sunday at the inaugural meeting in Los Angeles.

Hundreds of atheists and atheist-curious packed into a Hollywood auditorium for a boisterous service filled with live music, moments of reflection and an "inspirational talk, " and some stand-up comedy by Jones, the movement's co-founder.

During the service, attendees stomped their feet, clapped their hands and cheered as Jones and Evans led the group through rousing renditions of "Lean on Me," ''Here Comes the Sun" and other hits that took the place of gospel songs. Congregants dissolved into laughter at a get-to-know-you game that involved clapping and slapping the hands of the person next to them and applauded as members of the audience spoke about community service projects they had started in LA.

At the end, volunteers passed cardboard boxes for donations as attendees mingled over coffee and pastries and children played on the floor.

For atheist Elijah Senn, the morning was perfect. "I think the image that we have put forward in a lot of ways has been a scary, mean, we want to tear down the walls, we want to do destructive things kind of image is what a lot of people have of us," he said. "I'm really excited to be able to come together and show that it's not about destruction. It's about making things and making things better."

http://news.msn.com/us/atheist-mega-...ocid=ansnews11



see also : http://dannyfranks.wordpress.com/201...ently-a-thing/