Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed (Amended)

After a grueling morning working to get my yard spiffed up for summer I decided to clean myself up a bit and go see Expelled:No Intelligence Allowed, a documentary hosted by the affable, but dry-humored, Ben Stein. The following is my impressions and thoughts after I reflected a bit about what I saw.

First, I don't think that scientists who see signs of Intelligent Design (ID), and have honestly examined the evidence to the best of their ability according to their own calculations and experiments, are trying to push God back into public schools. From what I can see, it's people who want religion, God, and creation science-- especially of the Christian brand-- using the findings of ID scientists to push their agenda into public schools. The thinking behind this is the sense that America has lost its moral underpinnings when God and school prayer were outlawed. Schools could regain lost moral ground if God and prayer were allowed back into school. Supposedly, school children would be better behaved and would not indulge in sex, drugs, and rock-and-roll. Having attended Christian schools for most of my life, I can safely say that having God and prayer in school really doesn't make much difference in the behavior of the students. Speaking from my own experience (and yours may be different) a parochial school has just as much unruliness as a public school. Morality and religious faith are best kept in homes and churches. Parents cannot depend on schools to teach this with great effect.

It wasn't the point of the movie that creationism should be taught in public schools as a viable theory of how things came to be. The running theme throughout the movie was the investigation of the castigation of scientists who would dare mention ID in scholarly and scientific papers, and who might even present it in the university classroom. Many of these scientists were interviewed by Stein, and they seemed to me to be articulate, intelligent, and curious. They didn't appear to have any religious agenda. Many of them were once at the top of their fields, such as molecular biology, astronomy, mathematics, and physics. Their supposed "crime" was mentioning the possibility that ID may have some validity to it. All of them, from what I remembered, shied away from using the word "God" simply because it isn't a scientific term. These people promptly lost prestigious positions at leading universities, were fired, lost tenure, denied research grants, or blacklisted. I found this to be oddly humorous because this sort of thing happens in institutions of higher learning all of the time. It seems to be a rule of thumb that whoever dared to challenge the prevailing sentiments and worldviews of the establishment were excoriated (sometimes publicly) and removed from teaching positions.

I myself have Scriptural views, especially in the area of eschatology, that some would consider odd. But I'm not trying to buck the establishment, nor am I trying to lure unsuspecting people into a quick trip straight to hell. I believe the conclusions I've drawn are correct unless I can be persuasively shown otherwise. My studies are honest for the simple reason that I seek answers to some very deep questions that have plagued me for much of my life. I'm not a scholar and I don't play one on TV. I'm the kind of person who has to know why things are what they are claimed to be. I'll admit to certain biases; everyone should if they're honest. I never claim that I'm right or that my arguments deserve to be hermetically sealed in a vault and enshrined somewhere at Fort Knox. I'm wide open for discussion on these issues with the hope that I would not be castigated or labeled.

This, as far as I can tell, is the position of the ID scientists in the movie. They want honest discussion and civil debate on the scientific issues and theories that they deem should be reexamined, such as Darwinian Evolution (DE). They truly believe that the theory has holes in it. The burden of proof is on them to present the evidence. On the other hand, if ID is scientifically inferior, as the establishment DE proponents say, then the burden of proof is on them to demonstrate where ID is flawed scientifically. None of the DE scientists interviewed in the movie seemed willing to do so. Of course, that could be because of slick editing. The DE scientists also seemed articulate and intelligent. It seems to me that scientists of both stripes should get together in a mutually agreed upon venue and talk shop. I would love to see Dr. Eugenie Scott and Sir John Polkinghorne in such dialogue, or Dr. Richard Dawkins having scientific debate with Dr. Gerald Schroeder. I would love it even more if such discussion took place on bar stools! I'll understand very little of the conversations simply because I'm not a scientist. But just to know that such conversations are taking place would speak volumes about the intellectual integrity and dignity of the scientific community. We are, after all, talking about flesh and blood human beings with self-evident inalienable rights to use their minds and speak about what they have discovered.