A banner day, my darlings: the National Center for Science Education’s Expelled Exposed is fully operational and ready for battle. Expelled is going to get the crap knocked out of it. Well, what’s left of it, at any rate:
Welcome to Expelled Exposed, a detailed look at the Ben Stein movie Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed. We’ll show you why this movie is
not a documentary at all, but anti-science propaganda aimed at creating the appearance of controversy where there is none.
To learn why the claims made in Expelled are false, find out The Truth behind the Fiction. For information on the producers and their actions, go Behind the Scenes. To learn more about evolution and intelligent design, or to see what other people thought of Expelled, view our links to other online Resources.
Ah, yummy goodness. I know what I’m doing tomorrow night.
To celebrate the site’s launch, I’m serving up a delicious banquet of Expelled-taunting tidbits. But first, an imperative from PZ Myers:
We need to get the NCSE’s counter-site to the hideous little propaganda film, Expelled, to rank higher in the search engines. The way to do this is for lots and lots of you to link to the Expelled Exposed site with the word Expelled. It’s not hard: just copy this code into a blog post.
Expelled
He’s got red banners both top and bottom that repeat OBEY, so I think he’s serious. You know what to do, troops.
Next course: file this under “Doh! Why didn’t I think of this?” The Factician at Conspiracy Factory quotes Carl Sagan, and gives me a brilliant idea that has, alas, come far too late to take action on. It would have been all too much fun to prostelytize right outside the one (1) theater in the Seattle area that’s showing Expelled. How much fun would it have been to stand outside with a Candle o’ Science, handing out copies of Sagan’s The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark, and spreading the Good News of Science? A damn lot of fun. Too bad it’s too late to place a bulk order.
The Factician has really outdone himself this month: he’s also got this hysterically funny analysis of William Dumbski’s past predictions:
Expelled, the Musical is about to hit theaters! In theaters across the country! Well, in a few theaters. This has inspired creationist mathematician and philosopher William Dembski to fire up his prognostication machine!
And we all know how infallible that is. If you don’t, well, there’s a link up there for ye.
Great minds, I’m telling you. I’m talking Expelled: the Musical, so is he. Muy bueno.
Abby over at ERV’s our next confection. She absolutely murders the idea that the Expelled crew’s animation of an actin network is an original. Not ripped off from XVIVO at all. Nossir. And if you’re inclined to believe that, you either need to send me money, or you need to take a look at the sequence of photos at ERV that expel that notion thoroughly.
And, my darlings, the feast isn’t over yet. Via Expelled Exposed, we have a sinfully good New Scientist article about the debacle:
Expelled is pure propaganda, its style reminiscent of a sub-standard Michael Moore flick complete with voice-over narration and lots of aimless wandering around. Its selling point is that academic freedom in the US is threatened by a vast conspiracy of atheist scientists, hypnotised by what Stein labels in the film the “Darwinian gospel”.
Supporters of ID are fired from their institutions or denied tenure, the film argues, while journalists who report on ID are silenced or shunned. This is an old trick. By claiming their views are suppressed, proponents of ID hope to be protected from criticism. When someone argues that ID is bogus, all they need do is yell: “See? Suppression!”
A masterful summary, madam. Allow me to translate: what you’re saying is, they’re a bunch of whiny fuckers with a persecution complex.
And that’s it, my darlings. Couldn’t eat another bite. Let’s have a nice apertif, shall we? A little TV sounds excellent just now. And I have just the thing. You remember that list of scientists who signed a Discovery Institute declaration against Evolution, the Universe and everything? Well, funny thing, and I know this will shock you, but… they lied about the signatories:
“Now, tracking down many of these [scientists] was actually somewhat difficult because what the Discovery Institute would dishonestly do was
take the most prestigious organization that was ever affiliated with this individual, and they would put that beside their name.”
Ye gods, man! You mean to tell me, they made shit up? Egads! And then you inform me that of all the biologists who signed this document, of those you were able to contact, only two actually reject evolution? The rest were shocked and upset to find their names on that list? I am astonished, sir!
/sarcasm off
DonExodus2 is a generous man. He gives Disco their full 101 names, and calculates that IF those were all biologists (not mathematicians and so forth) and IF they ALL rejected evolution, they would represent .0025% of the biologists in America. I’m not so generous. I calculated by those biologists who didn’t state uncategorically that they do not reject evolution, and I get a figure of .00074%.
Yes. That’s right. An infintesimal fraction of biologists in this country are total fuckwits. The rest are perfectly sane, even though their poor names got dragged through the muck by Disco.
Why do I get a feeling there won’t be a sudden stampede of biologists rushing into the free air of Intelligent Design once Expelled is released?
Our feast is ended for tonight, my darlings, but I have no doubt that Expelled and Crew will provide a hearty bounty for us as the week wears on.
Salud!
