Can I Ask You a Question?
The new movie - Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed - from Premise Media, starring Ben Stein, asks an interesting question about scientific inquiry (asking questions) in the modern era. Can scientists ask questions without fear of being censored, ridiculed, ostracized, told to shut-up, or expelled? Is there still freedom of speech and academic freedom? Why are some scientific inquiries being censored on college campuses today?
From what I understand, the film asks some hard questions about university life in the Neo-Darwinian era.
It’s interesting that the film was released in theaters yesterday (April 18, 2008) — since 126 years ago (April 19, 1882) Charles Darwin died.
Darwin had studied medicine at Edinburgh University in 1825. According to an Encyclopedia Brittanica article about Charles Darwin “Edinburgh attracted English Dissenters who were barred from graduating at the Anglican universities of Oxford and Cambridge” and “Darwin heard freethinkers deny the Divine design”. However, some speech “was officially censored” and “was considered subversive”. The EB article goes on to state that “Darwin was witnessing the social penalties of holding deviant views.”
Today, we are witnessing a kind of “reverse reactionary apartheid” and prejudice against anyone who appears to be “Anti-Darwinian”. This whole thing seems a lot more like a high-school food fight, then a mature scientific discussion. Why is inquiry being stifled? Maybe these scientists (the ones being expelled from colleges and universities) are not really “Anti-Darwinian”. Maybe they want to be like Darwin, and have the academic freedom to ask intelligent questions. Is that OK with you?
Updates:
Brent Bozell III, in a Yahoo News article on 18-Apr-2008 says:
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).
Frank Scheck, in a film review for the Hollywood Reporter dated 21-Apr-2008 says:
… this documentary purporting to examine the issue of freedom of expression in the debate between the competing arguments of “intelligent design” and Darwinism squanders the potential fascination of its topic with its simplistic, heavy-handed approach.
Frank, I think you missed the point! How would you make a documentary that American young people will actually watch? If it wasn’t hard hitting would people even watch it? The American school system has been doing such a good job of dumbing people down, that we sometimes have to shock people to get them thinking again. The movie was supposed to be a defibrillator for the brain.
Ed Morrissey, in a Hot Air article reviewing Expelled, is amused by the debate:
Amusingly, Stein asks people how the first cell came to be. None of the scientists could give him a straight answer. Dawkins himself admits he doesn’t know and that no one else does, either — but postulates that aliens could have brought life to this planet, and then postulates that another alien civilization could have brought life to that planet, and so on. He then concedes that one entity could have been the original source … but insists that entity could not possibly have been God. For this he gives absolutely no evidence at all, relegating it as a belief system somewhat akin to Scientology.
A Los Angeles Times story says: “‘Expelled’ could exceed box-office forecasts”
New York Times claims its one of the sleaziest documentaries to arrive in a very long time.
Time Magazine says Ben Stein Dukes it Out With Darwin:
In fairness to Stein, his opponents have hardly covered themselves in glory. Evolutionary biologists and social commentators have lately taken to answering the claims of intelligent-design boosters not with clear-eyed scientific empiricism but with sneering, finger-in-the-eye atheism. Biologist P.Z. Myers, for example, tells Stein that religion ought to be seen as little more than a soothing pastime, a bit like knitting.
Shawn Barr said the movie did not live up to the criticisms thrown at it by the media:
The main focus of the movie is the question of academic freedom. By interviewing scholars who have been discriminated against because of their ID or faith views, Stein shows a form of bigotry in academia. Critics say these people had other issues affecting their job performance and scholarship. Of course that is the approach each institution representative took. How could they say anything else?
Iowa State University though actually admitted that eliminating a professor for his ID views was a part of their intent. Being an alumnus, I’m duly glad they were honest, and disappointed with their treatment of Gonzalez: a physics professor. One reason they may have been so honest is the existence of emails documenting the concern over his ID views. Whether or not there were other issues with his tenure, ID was certainly one of them.
Shawn Barr does make a good point about academic bigotry at Iowa State University in the case of Guillermo Gonzalez, and something worth investigating a little deeper. (It seems like they were singing a different song. It would be interesting to know the chronology of events.) According to a World Net Daily news article about Guillermo Gonzalez, published back on Feb. 7, 2008 (Regents reject tenure request without evidence, testimony) :
The school has continued to deny the handling of Gonzalez’ case was related to his support of ID, even though the Des Moines Register documented e-mails that confirmed Gonzalez’ colleagues wanted him flushed out of the system for that reason.
Was Gonzalez somehow derelict in publishing 350 percent more peer-reviewed publications than his own department’s stated standard for research excellence? Or in co-authoring a college astronomy textbook with Cambridge University Press? Or in having his research recognized by Science, Nature, Scientific American and other top science publications?
One of Gonzalez’ research papers had 153 citations listed; another had 139. This is a LOT of citations for an assistant professor up for tenure.
The big debate continues at the Discovery Institute in this article: Attack on Expelled Exposes Intolerance of Darwinists towards Pro-Intelligent Design Scientists.
FaceTheReckoning says connecting the dots to Hitler is all about worldview:
“… the worldview that is shared by Nazi Germany and Planned Parenthood which echo Darwin’s natural selection and survival of the fittest.”
Earl Barnett says the best part is when Richard Dawkins makes a case for Intelligent Design:
The movie seeks to ‘expose’ the bias in modern science against the concept of ‘Intelligent Design’. While the movie successfully accomplishes not only this, but also films Richard Dawkins making a case for Intelligent Design…
Bad said,
April 19, 2008 at 11:45 pm
“The new movie - Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed - from Premise Media, starring Ben Stein, asks an interesting question about scientific inquiry (asking questions) in the modern era. Can scientists ask questions without fear of being censored, ridiculed, ostracized, told to shut-up, or expelled?”
It doesn’t “ask a question:” it makes a full on accusation. But to get there, it plays ever so fast and loose with the facts. Take your WND article (not a good source to pick if accuracy is any concern). It’s listing work that’s mostly not relevant to tenure at ISU, because it was done under the auspices of other people and labs. The whole point of his time at ISU was to see whether he could make it on his own. And the reality is that his publication numbers and quality plummeted, he brought in virtually no grant money at all (compared to an average of millions for others there), and graduated no grad students in several years. WND is basically counting things that aren’t relevant to the decision, and then not telling you the rest of the story.
Nor do the emails actually support the claims made. They show that some reviewers thought ill of his ID work, but they do not show at all that this was the factor that decided anyone against him, just something they talked about. And why would they? Because it was Gonzalez who submitted his ID work to the committee for consideration in the first place!
The question here is that if ID is just good science, then why are people demanding special protection for it based on religious discrimination? Other scientific ideas don’t get such protection. If I submit a paper for review, and other scientists judge it to be lousy, am I supposed to get affirmative action just because I make a fuss about how the conclusions of the paper are connected to my religious beliefs? Either ID is science, and thus up for criticism, or it isn’t, in which case it’s wholly illegitimate that people are trying to pass it off as science. You can’t have it both ways.
patrick said,
April 23, 2008 at 4:32 am
just saw Expelled; the fact that Ben Stein isn’t trying to win any popularity contests helps to validate his message… i gather that his goal is to promote free thought, especially more thinking about worldviews that drive American academia
Hugh Wessel said,
April 26, 2008 at 10:40 pm
It would be helpful, in my opinion, if we remember that science, philosophy, and faith issues are separate categories. When Richard Dawkins speculates about ET, he has left science, which deals in the material world, and enters the realm of philosophy, which, is of course fine; but, others are free to philosophize, too! On the other hand, when ID people say they are doing science, it would be better to describe their writing as philosophy at best, and, unfortunately, at times it heads directly into faith issues. Philosophy uses reasoning and logic: Philosophers try to construct coherent, intellectually satisfying constructs. Finally, there are faith issues, which deal with belief in the spiritual realm.
People of faith are able to work as scientists. It is worth noting that ‘belief’ is not necessarily incompatible with either science or philosophy. Scientist’s work gets peered reviewed; Philosophers publish in academic journals where their work is open to criticism: one can ’see’ that there is more subjectivity in philosophy than science; finally, questions of faith are usually related to communities of believers, traditions and sacred texts, which are even more difficult to discuss because of the faith commitment of the believer.
There are obviously good and poor scientists and philosophers; on the other hand, people of faith may argue their position poorly, practice it inconsistently, or not all, and still subscribe to their faith!