Over at scienceblogs.com biologist PZ Myers has dumbo Michael Medved in a headlock for commenting on “American DNA” and race, two subjects Medved, obviously, knows nothing about.
Well, I dug through Medved’s archives and found this piece of garbage.
Actually, there’s little chance that atheists will succeed in placing one of their own in the White House at any time in the foreseeable future, and it continues to make powerful sense for voters to shun potential presidents who deny the existence of God. An atheist may be a good person, a good politician, a good family man (or woman), and even a good patriot, but a publicly proclaimed non-believer as president would, for three reasons, be bad for the country.
Chances are that we have already had an atheist president. American politicians bow to religion only out of self-preservation and politeness, anyway. Clinton was seen carrying a bible around at the same time he was in trouble over Monica. George Bush likes to be seen as a religious man, but we all know his actions contradict most Christian tenets.
Abraham Lincoln was a very non-religious man. And George Washington at one point vowed never to attend church again. The founding fathers were mostly deists, which is one step from being atheistic. But who knows what their personal beliefs really were? Atheist was a dirty (dirtier) word back then.
If we read between the lines, what Medved is really saying is that only Christians should be elected to office. The problem is that religious people lie for their faith, and politicians lie to keep their asses in office. Besides, an atheist president couldn’t be any worse than Bush the Christian.
Remember this? Sherri Sheppherd, one of the hosts of that vacuous show The View,stated last year that she didn’t believe in evolution and that she didn’t know if the Earth was flat or not. Well, one of the stars from the ABC show Cavemen paid her a visit. Sadly, Cavemen was cancelled months ago. I thought the show was funny. Three cavemen living in an apartment in San Diego. What?
I offically declare Ben Stein as May’s creationist of the month. He earns his position for his ignorance and sleazy behavior.
In Expelled: The Movie, Ben Stein attempts to draw a link between Charles Darwin and the Holocaust by misreading a quote from Darwin’s famous book The Descent Of Man. Scientific America Magazine explains with an article:
One of the many egregious moments in the new Ben Stein anti-evolution film “Expelled” is the truncation of a quote from Charles Darwin so that it makes him appear to give philosophical ammunition to the Nazis.
Here is Ben Stein quote-mining Darwin in the movie Expelled:
“With savages, the weak in body or mind are soon eliminated. We civilized men, on the other hand, do our utmost to check the process of elimination. We build asylums for the imbecile, the maimed and the sick. Thus the weak members of civilized societies propagate their kind. No one who has attended to the breeding of domestic animals will doubt that this must be highly injurious to the race of man. Hardly anyone is so ignorant as to allow his worst animals to breed.”
Now here’s is the rest of Charles Darwin’s words, the part Stein conveniently left out:
“The aid which we feel impelled to give to the helpless is mainly an incidental result of the instinct of sympathy, which was originally acquired as part of the social instincts, but subsequently rendered, in the manner previously indicated, more tender and more widely diffused. Nor could we check our sympathy, even at the urging of hard reason, without deterioration in the noblest part of our nature. The surgeon may harden himself whilst performing an operation, for he knows that he is acting for the good of his patient; but if we were intentionally to neglect the weak and helpless, it could only be for a contingent benefit, with an overwhelming present evil.”
The Descent Of Manis a thick book, perhaps too thick for Ben Stein’s thick head. He might not have had the discipline to read it in full. Or maybe he didn’t edit the quote himself, he could have just read it that way from a script. Either way it looks bad, really bad. Ben Stein is either too lazy to pick up a book, or he’s a prositute-puppet, who says anything for money. Congratulations to Ben Stein for being creationist of the month, he’s earned it.
P.S. I recommend The Descent Of Man to anyone interested in evolution or the history of science. I read it last summer. It’s truly fascinating. The Penguin Classics Edition has a great introduction. Also, check out the complete works of Charles Darwin online.
Dissect any creationist’s arguments and you’ll eventually uncover a belief in a worldwide Darwinian conspiracy. Scientists everywhere are hiding the truth of creation and teaching evolution as part of a vague shadowy plot to destroy religion and to corrupt the world’s youth with liberal ideas. Why should scientists do this? Is it for that sweet professorship level income? Is it to be in the presence of mobs of grateful undergraduate students? Or are all scientists radicals?
A better question is do scientists get along well enough to concoct a conspiracy? I’ve just finished reading The Earth Dwellers: Adventures in The Land Of Ants by Erich Hoyt. And featured in this book is entomologist Edward O. Wilson, who’s famous for creating the sub-field called sociobiology. One of the implications of sociobiology is that human behavior is partly genetic. Unfortunately, some people erroneously saw hints of social-Darwinism, racism, and sexism, in Wilson’s work. As a result, Wilson received nasty criticism and personal attacks not only from the public but from his colleagues at Harvard University. Two of his most vocal critics were fellow professors Stephen J. Gould and Richard C. Lewontin. Do you feel the love?
In the book, we also get a glimpse into Wilson’s feelings toward James Watson, the co-discoverer of the structure of DNA. The author writes:
Wilson found Watson the most unpleasant, scornful scientist he had ever met. Watson’s discovery [DNA structure] was so earth-shattering that he [Watson] became a “Caligula” who could do or say no wrong. In spite of Watson’s disdain, Wilson deeply admired the man’s accomplishment and even his sheer audacity. He credits Watson as his “brilliant enemy” or “adverse hero”.
This is just one example of conflict amongst scientists. The history of science is fraught with nasty disagreements. What good scientist wouldn’t disagree with a colleague in order to gain personal glory? If the evidence and data indicate a contrary opinion, then that’s the path one must take? Wilson found Watson “unpleasant”, but he still admired the man’s work. It’s the work that counts, not loyalty and ideology. Of course, scientists are human, and like everyone they have their biases. But most of the time they have no misgivings about following the data wherever it leads. This is why a worldwide conspiracy to hide the “truth of creation” simply wouldn’t work. And this is why evolutionary science couldn’t be suppressed in the 19th century.
I like the humor, but I disagree with including atheism in a list of shitty religions. It’s not a religion. This is why atheists argue so much amongst themselves. Freethinking is just that, free. And come to think of it, Taoism and Buddhism shouldn’t be in there either. Meditating and contemplating your place in the universe isn’t religious, it’s spiritual. Uh Oh, they forgot to add Agnosticism.
Agnosticism: Is that shit on my shoe or not? I’m just not sure.
I’m shocked at how little Ben Stein knows about evolution. And I’m surprised by him blatantly connecting intelligent design and religion. For years, intelligent design promoters struggled to cast ID as a science. But here is Ben Stein sitting down with that disgusting clown, Pat Robertson. I think Stein’s legacy will be the death of the Intelligent Design movement and, of course, the death of his own integrity.
Chuck Norris has written his own review, of sorts, of Expelled: the Movie. It’s actually more of an endorsement than a review, since he really doesn’t describe the movie in any detail. He just makes a sucking noise as he presses his lips up against Ben Stein’s ass. On to the comedy… I mean review.
I saw it last weekend, and I liked it. I think it will wake up many people to the truth. What truth? That educational arenas have become limited learning environments because of biases against God, the Bible and creationism.
Wow! It’s like wading through a cesspool of ignorance. The bias you speak of, Chuck, is toward evidence. If God would only make himself more available for interviews, creationists could offer something more than cheap unsubstantiated conclusions, ones which lead science nowhere. If biologists suddenly acknowledged God’s invisible hand in creation how would it further their work? Something that cannot be measured or analyzed or observed isn’t useful one bit to science. More now from Chuck:
Stein is correct in saying that passionate antagonism and hostility (that parallels any fundamentalist extremism) equally exists in naturalist and Neo-Darwinian camps. Proof of their avid bias easily can be seen in some evolutionists’ reviews of this film. Many are loaded with as much inflammatory language, intolerance and bigotry as any hate-filled group.
Inflammatory language? Who’s the one comparing scientists to Nazis? Ben Stein declared that “Darwinism leads to Social-Darwinism” and that Charles Darwin’s writings inspired the Holocaust. How more inflammatory and hate-filled can one get than by playing the Hitler card? Negative reviews of Expelled criticize Ben Stein for his inaccuracy and his ignorance of science, not for his tenuous connection to a genocidal militaristic mad man. But leave it to creationist liars to be the ultimate hypocrites.
Chuck ends his “review” with a plug for religious freedom and for teaching the Bible in public schools… as a textbook. Freedom of religion is great. We can agree on that. But I just wonder how open Chuck would be to the teaching of religions other than Christianity? Is it really about freedom or about maintaining a Christian monopoly?
Take a good long look at the dim-witted fool in the above picture. He just turned Florida into an international joke. His name is Alan Hays.
A nebulous bill that allows teachers “to poke holes in the theory of evolution” passed in the Florida House. The bill passed 71-43. The full story can be read in the Miami Herald.
State Rep. Alan Hays, the republican who sponsored the bill, commented:
That’s a fancy way of saying it allows the teachers, without fear, to expose the holes in the scientific theory of evolution, No fossils have been found and no witness has ever seen one species turn into another. This is only a theory. [emphasis added]
Alan Hays is a retired dentist. The reasons given for the legislation were “to protect teachers’ jobs” and to ensure “academic freedom”.
Asked which teachers fear that teaching the ”holes” in evolution will lead to trouble, Hays acknowledged he didn’t have any names. ”This is being done as a preventive measure,” Hays said.
I know where I’m not spending my next vacation. If you want to voice your opinion to the Florida Board Of Tourism, GO HERE.
If you want to support the Florida Citizens For Science, GO HERE.
Perhaps Alan Hays D.D.S. will comment on string theory next.
I love this video because it’s beautifully simple and to the point. If I may paraphrase Al Gore when he appeared on the animated show Futurama:
Ben Stein, “you fool, you foolish fool”.
College education ain’t what it used to be, if Ben Stein thinks Darwinism leads to Social-Darwinism. One is a science, the other is an action. Darwinism simply explains how new species come about. It unites all humans beings as, at the least, cousins. Ben Stein is my very distant cousin, whether I like it or not. To see a group of people as genetically inferior requires one to throw away science, not to embrace it
So, only an ignorant boob would claim that a set of dry facts and theories leads to immoral behavior. Does car mechanics lead to drunk driving? Does calculus lead to lethal projectiles? The application or misapplication of a science has nothing to do with its validity. That you cannot see this, Ben, makes me sad.
I guess actually reading Darwin’s books was too difficult for Ben Stein, so instead he stood in front of a statue and contemplated what evolution might be like. This is, of course, Stein trying to mark evolution as a religion, and not a science, something the Intelligent Design crowd has been trying to do for years.
The challenge for creationists is for them to make their point without mentioning evolution. I know scientists can speak of evolution without even broaching the subject of a creation or design. But propagandists like Ben Stein cannot further their cause without tearing down evolutionary biology. The reason is they have nothing to support their claims. Intelligent design isn’t a science and cannot stand alone.
And I want to know why Stein brings religion into the Intelligent Design argument, when for years other Intelligent Design proponents have tried to keep the two completely separate. Is ID science or religion? You creationists need to make up your minds.
