Expelled

I've been seeing all the broo ha ha about this film, and I thought I'd start a list of link sites relating to it. The only way I'll ever see the movie is if it gets uploaded to youtube.

Expelled Exposed is a National Center for Science Education resource site. Lots of great links.

There's a great list of links at Greg Laden's blog.

My favorite story so far is the priceless tale of PZ Myers getting Expelled from Expelled while Richard Dawkins went unrecognized and got to experience the film unhindered.

update 4/17/2008:
There's been a flap about the film containing images for which they had no permissions for use. Now it seems they used music without permission, including John Lennon's "Imagine" owned now by Yoko Ono. She is apparently not a happy camper. I saw the news at Panda's Thumb. They are claiming fair use rights since the clip is less than 25 seconds long. I'm a big advocate of Fair Use but don't know if this particular use qualifies.

There's also a wonderful report that "they" from PZ Myers to Ben Stein are in cahoots to bring down Creationism/ID. I love conspiracy theories.

Threads From Henry's Web, the blog of a Methodist author, has a post which says in part,

The problem I have is that Expelled! is also squeezing some folks out, and they are making Christianity Today a co-conspirator in that process. The ones squeezed out? All those Christians, even evangelical Christians who would like much of what Christianity Today publishes, but who accept the theory of evolution.

This is one of the many problems with this movie. It frames the controversy as one between theists and atheists, between moral people and immoral people, and thus leaves out Christian evolutionists, moral atheists, and many people who are not particularly religious or anti-religious, but are simply out there doing the best science they can. As one of those Christian evolutionists, I find this implication appalling. According to this movie and its promoters, I’m a co-conspirator with a bunch of Nazis to persecute Christians.

4/21/2008:
There've been so many articles on Expelled I didn't add them here, but now that it's been released I thought I'd add some links to comments I've seen.

Evolving Thoughts thinks the Creationism/ID folks should be given the press because it leads to more people learning about science.

Quintessence of Dust wants to expose up to the alternative Stork Theory.

Reasons to Believe sees the movie as harmful to the cause, explaining,

In Reasons To Believe's interaction with professional scientists, scientific institutions, universities, and publishers of scientific journals we have encountered no significant evidence of censorship, blackballing, or disrespect.

Exploring Our Matrix pointed me to the AAAS statement. They also have links to a few interesting blog posts and reviews.

The Panda's Thumb has the numbers on the film's opening week-end. They also report the numbers from RottenTomatoes, comment on a review from Waco, Texas, a link to the NYT review, a link to Scientific American's report on Ben Stein's quote mining, a link to the Ayn Rand Institute's press release and much more. A great place to keep up with reporting on the "documentary".

Dispatches From the Culture Wars says it flopped.

4/22/2008:
Exploring the Matrix has a couple more links here and here.

Reviews by Higgaion and EvolutionBlog.

Pharyngula has links to a thorough review of the official Expelled study guide.

The Questionable Authority is one of many bloggers discussing the attempt to spin the opening of Expelled as an unmitigated success.

4/25/2008:
Dispatches from the Culture Wars has more links.

Alternet has a review, which closes with this:

Mencken's remarks that we have the right to hold controversial and even stupid beliefs is not without merit. It's a beautiful idea, and a wonderfully American notion -- this innate sense of democratic principles that we all have a say in how things should be.

Expelled takes this idea and perverts it, arguing that truth and evidence is irrelevant. All sides should be treated as equal.

But as Mencken said, free speech does not give one the right to demand that these ideas be treated as sacred.

4/29/2008:
Scroll down to see the review at the blog The Evolution of a Creationist, which closes with this:

So what is making me angry? Honestly, it's the fact that one year ago I would have fallen for Stein's presentation—hook, line, and sinker. I'm also angry at how easily Christians fall for half-truths and outright lies. I'm angry at how often we Christians check our brains at the door and are perfectly willing to serve as messenger boys for the most outrageous urban legends, folk sciences, doctrines, and just plain idiotic belief systems. I'm angry at Christianity's penchant for dismissing the claims of biological and astronomical science despite the voluminous amount of evidence in favor of evolution.

5/4/2008:
NationalReviewOnline voices this opinion of the basic problem with ID as evidenced in Expelled:

They overhauled creationism as “intelligent design,” roped in a handful of eccentric non-Christian cranks keen for a well-funded vehicle to help them push their own flat-earth theories, and set about presenting themselves to the public as “alternative science" engaged in a “controversy” with a closed-minded, reactionary “science establishment” fearful of new ideas. (Ignoring the fact that without a constant supply of new ideas, there would be nothing for scientists to do.) Nothing to do with religion at all!

I think this willful act of deception has corrupted creationism irredeemably. The old Biblical creationists were, in my opinion, wrong-headed, but they were mostly honest people. The “intelligent design” crowd lean more in the other direction.

5/6/2008:
GetReligion says, "The film, starring Ben Stein, argues that Intelligent Design should not be systematically excluded from academia. It doesn’t argue for Intelligent Design or against Darwinism so much as for academic freedom" and argues that the documentary should be taken more seriously and given more press by mainstream media. This response surprised me. It's my understanding that the film is filled with "facts" that aren't and the worst sort of propaganda. The fact that it did reasonably well at the box office does not make me expect the mainstream film reviewers and news reporters to think it deserving of press. I see a definite difference between Expelled and the Gore and Michael Moore movies, which are at least based on verifiable facts.

5/10/2008:
Boston Globe's review sees the film as a sure sign that Science is in trouble and closes with this:

"Expelled" is a shoddy piece of propaganda that props up the failures of Intelligent Design by playing the victim card. It deceives its audiences, slanders the scientific community, and contributes mightily to a climate of hostility to science itself. Stein is doing nothing less than helping turn a generation of American youth away from science. If we actually come to believe that science leads to murder, then we deserve to lose world leadership in science. In that sense, the word "expelled" may have a different and more tragic connotation for our country than Stein intended.

Panda's Thum continues to post links to reviews and articles as they are published.

5/21/2008:

Thomas Robb (HT: Dispatches from the Culture Wars) says that the Jewish Ben Stein has made this movie in order to promote race mixing in the Christian community. Amazing. Why didn't I see that coming. Hobb says,

The message of the movie is not about creationism but to trap Christians into accepting, tolerating, promoting and engaging in interracial relationships and marriage. After all as Christians we don’t want to promote the evils of Darwin - do we? The trap has been set - don't get caught!

You can't make this stuff up.

5/29/2008:

The United Methodist Reporter has a review which focuses on the appeal to emotion in the film but gives the factual errors a pass.