Win Ben Stein's Career

[Iason Ouabache]

Ok.  Because you are demanding it I will trudge on.  Don't expect me to like it though...

And now we get to hear from the Scientific Establishment.  Whatever the hell that is.

Dawkins, PZ Myers, Dennett, and Christopher Hitchens, OH MY!!  There are also a whole bunch of other scientists that I don't recognize and aren't identified. So far I haven't heard anything that I disagree with. "ID isn't real science" "ID is just political propaganda" "ID is stupid" "Science education already sucks in the US, we don't need ID to make it even worse." "ID is Creationism in disguise"  The movie isn't really convincing me that these people are crazy or fascist or wrong in any way.

The guy who calls ID boring (they never give his name) is hilarious.  I wish there was a clip of it on YouTube. He's so animated about it.

A quick clip of protesters outside the Creationism Museum.  Awesome! Plus there are long clips of people bashing the Discovery Institute.  I'm still not disagreeing with anything here... Did the directors stop trying again?

OH SHI- Ben Stein is going to Seattle to talk to DI!  Well, he is trying to find it but the office is so small and out of the way that he can't find it.  Is this supposed to convey the fact that DI is minuscule and therefore harmless? It'd be more convincing if they didn't pull in millions of dollars from gullible donors every year.

He finally finds it on the 9th floor of a nondescript office building.  He's making a very very big deal about how tiny the office is. We get a quick tour with tons of office workers prairie-dogging their heads around corners.  This is soooo staged that it's ridiculous.  I wonder which one is the wonderful and illustrious Casey Luskin.

Stein does a one-on-one interview with president Bruce Chapman.  First thing out of his mouth, "This is not a religious argument."  BULLSHIT!!  Their entire argument is about Christian apologetics and wedging God back into the classroom. 

Another lie: "We want the best scientific evidence brought forward."  Great!  Where is your scientific evidence then?  When the hell are you going to present your own evidence instead of attempting to poke holes in evolution?  Where is the scientific evidence for an Intelligent Designer?  Anything???

"It's not about religion, so let's go to the Bible Institute of Los Angeles"    Ben next talks to some crank named Paul Nelson who says that in private biologists will let down their guard and say that evolution's "got a lot of problems." And that everyone agrees that "change over time" happens but that biologists disagree that "common descent from a common ancestor, etc" happens. And my personal favorite, "Intelligent Design is the study of patterns in nature that are best explained by intelligence."  I wish I could stab this guy in the face.

Oh yay!  William Dembski!  This should be mind-numbingly stupid. For those who don't know Mr. Bill, his basic "hypothesis" is that evolution is pretty much correct expect for a couple places that we can't explain via natural causes.  I'm sure that he has a shrine to the God of the Gaps in his basement... And apparently Darwin was just over-zealous with his ideas. And Dembski is the next Einstein.

(PS, Bill:  You still owe everyone a bottle of single-malt scotch.)

The Cavalcade of Dunces returns us back to Stephen C. Meyer. He seems to believe that since Newton was (kinda) wrong that Darwin is completely wrong.  And that because there is a consensus among biologists that the theory of evolution is correct, it must be wrong. Is there a word for the opposite of "Argumentum ad populum"? He keeps talking about all this evidence against Darwinism but he never presents any of it.  I wonder why...

Ok, that's enough for one night.  I don't have any alcohol so I can't go any further.  Still only 27 minutes through the thing too.

[Kai]

 

I've been waiting years to hear those arguements against "darwinism" and they invariably turn out to be the old tired religious explanations we've all heard before. This is why they never talk about evidence, because its all religious evidence, but the whole thing has become such a circle jerk because no one else will listen to them now. They are trying to convince themselves.

[Iason Ouabache]

Ok, I'm bored and decided to pick this up around the 28 minute point...

Next interviews two of Discovery Institutes' finest, Jonathan Wells, author of the infamous pile of shit The Icons of Evolution and David Berlinski, the token "Agnostic".  This should be fun.  Wells starts right in with the "Oh noes!  They called me a Creationist and told me to shut up" line.  He adds in his little conspiracy theory that evidence is being distorted to prop up evolution. 

Berlinski lists a pretty impressive resume of all the colleges that he's taught at (Stanford, Rutgers, the City University of New York, the University of Washington, the University of Puget Sound, San Jose State University, the University of Santa Clara, the University of San Francisco, and San Francisco State University). He forgot to mention that he is "a critic, a contrarian, and — by his own admission — a crank". He does the usual Creationist philosophical rope-a-dope by saying that since we don't have a clear cut definition of species thus the theory of evolution is completely wrong.

Next up, Dawkins.  Maybe he'll beat some sense into Stein.  He does a good job of pointing out that evolution is a well-established scientific fact and anyone who denies it is insane, stupid and/or ignorant.

Back to Wells, who plays the micro/macro evolution card.  He says that minor changes within species happens but that there is no evidence for common descent. I guess the entire branch of science called Genetics doesn't exist in Wells' world. He follows this up by correctly pointing out that there is no strong theory of abiogenesis yet.

Stein takes this opportunity to segue to a scene from "Cosmic Origins: from Big Bang to Mankind".  Don't ask me how they got permission to use it.  The movie correctly describes the abiogenesis hypothesis that life may have started from a electrical spark striking a collection of organic chemicals. Stein also describes the Miller-Urey experiment (more or less accurately) over footage of Frankenstein.  He then proceeds to lie by saying that the experiment was a failure because it didn't produce life.  He completely fails to mention that Miller successfully produced 22 amino acids  using just water, methane, ammonia, hydrogen, and electricity.  Or that Jeffrey Bada recently recreated the experiment with an updated hypothetical atmosphere and also produced amino acids. Honesty is not one of his strong suits, I see.

Now we get to hear Michael Ruse explain an alternate theory.  He gives a very short synopsis of the Clay Theory of Abiogenesis and the director decides to mock him by showing a pic of a mystic looking at a crystal ball.    The interview definitely looks like it's had some judicious editing done to it.  You can tell that Ruse is exasperated from having to repeat himself several times.  It looks like Stein repeated leading questions several times and the director just kept the most ridiculous sounding over-simplifications.  Very classy.

35 minute mark.  I'm beginning to think that I'll never get through this pile of crap.  Just shoot me now!!!

[CynicalCichilid]

No wonder they incorrectly described the outcome of the Miller-Urey experiment, any Christian with an iota of scientific knowledge would realize that the creation of life isn't as magical as they thought.

35 minute mark.  I'm beginning to think that I'll never get through this pile of crap.  Just shoot me now!!!

Keep going, its a thankless and dirty job but someone's gotta it. Reading the poison in your words begin to reach boiling point has got me hooked.

[Kai]

Not only did Bada reproduce amino acids, but experiments with conditions like that of hydrothermal vents have produced all 5 base pairs, ribonucleic acids, and dioxyriboneucleic acids, which is all you need to make DNA and RNA.

Which is why my sig is the way it is.

[Vene]

Not only did Bada reproduce amino acids, but experiments with conditions like that of hydrothermal vents have produced all 5 base pairs, ribonucleic acids, and dioxyriboneucleic acids, which is all you need to make DNA and RNA.

Which is why my sig is the way it is.

Well, assuming that phosphate is present.

Also, I have to go find the article for this again.  Because it's just that cool.
http://www.springerlink.com/content/aq10866526v08u65/

[Kai]

Yep, thats the one.

LaRowe and Regnier should get the fuckin nobel prize for this, srsly.

[jams002]

what is this what do you mean of this    
Win Ben Stein's Career i can not relate??





___________________
Great thing to know about busby seo test.

[Vene]

Iason!  I demand MOAR!