by Joe Palvado

Created on: October 27, 2008

Ben Stein's documentary, Expelled, No Intelligence Allowed, is both entertaining and brilliant. A masterful treatise on academic hypocrisy, Stein's film reveals a vehemently intolerant global pack of scientific academes: anyone who fails to embrace the purely speculative (as in highly unlikely) Darwinian argument regarding the origin of mankind must be excluded from the club. Free speech is not an option. Alternative opinions are unwelcome. There will be no questions. Civil discourse is of course allowed, even encouraged and rewarded provided the proposition supports the consensus opinion of those who hold all the marbles(grants, tenure).

The terribly unfortunate and apparent reality that such a hateful and intolerant position even exists within such a prestigious environment leaves one befuddled. A more logical mind would surmise that friendly dialog among professionals would stimulate a desire to seek the truth. But truth has to do with ethical behavior. Truth may too closely relate to the traditional definition of morality. To the Darwinian disciple, intelligent design is simply horrible, stupid, archaic and hateful; a conspiracy initiated by deists and Christian terrorist-fundamentalists. The tirades seem more like the children's rhyme, "I'm rubber and you're glue, what bounces off of me sticks on you". Stein reveals an ugly reality. While science should be about honest inquiry in the pursuit of reality, the scientific community has lost its academic legitimacy. Could it be that ethics and morality are the real stumbling blocks within this oppressive and disingenuous environment? The practice of scientific discovery is not served by propaganda. The premise put forth in the Stein film warns of potential dangers inherent when an ideological imperative demands obedience before reason, ethics or morality.

Why do government controlled agents of education exclude, indeed condemn anyone who rejects the obviously erroneous assumptions posited by Darwin within the very environments that purport freedom, inclusion and diversity in search of discovery? Aren't the values that advance creativity and discovery worth preserving? Isn't the type of behavior that these otherwise intelligent people illustrate an immature and potentially lethal impediment to learning?

Lord Acton was attributed the quote, "Power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely". Stein poignantly reiterates that belief. Power, in this instance, does indeed pervert justice. Stein has made a compelling case confirming that reality and drags a very ugly beast into the light of day.

Another sort of evolution has been completely rejected by the perpetrators who are orchestrating the gross injustice represented through academic prejudice. Ethics and morality are the realm of theologians, of the religious, of people of faith. For thousands of years an understanding regarding human nature and concepts relating to good and evil have been studied, scrutinized, taught and lived, even if sometimes badly, by a people who believe in God. Those very people are an encumbrance to powerful interests who must not be bothered by concepts of human behavior as seen through the lens of faith in a Supreme Being.

A little moral clarity would serve the academe much better than the casting of aspersions upon a people who genuinely want nothing more than to benefit humanity. Stein appeals for a return to sanity in an otherwise insane environment. See the movie. Then form your own opinion. It is, after all, your right.

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