Issue 139

News/Review: Expelled: There's a reason it is.
In the last entry, I mentioned that I had wanted to see Expelled, mainly to write a column here to see how much bull it was, but my usual channels failed me. Finally, I looked on YouTube, and it was there, and so, I finally saw it. I was right, and even though I finally watched it, it was very much what I had expected it to be: a movie about Ben Stein griping about how Intelligent Design is "persecuted." What I didn't expect was that he would actually fail to try and give any real argument about why it should be considered at all more valid. The closest thing he comes to creating an argument was when he claims that the odds of the first life forming are somewhere in the area of 1 in 10^72, (of course, the "scientist" quoted does only say the word trillion six times). However, even if the odds of this happening were so small, this does not necessarily mean that this is impossible. I will show you exactly how this argument is flawed. Imagine a raffle at a high school with 1000 students in the raffle, and one student wins. Another student protests that the odds of the winner winning are 1000:1, and that the winner must have cheated, failing to account for the fact that the odds of anybody else winning are about the same. The only other argument that Stein attempts to make, that evolutionary ideas were a major influence on Hitler, is very flawed, because even if science hadn't long since repudiated eugenical ideas such as Hitler's, even if there was any evidence that Hitler was more influenced by evolution than his interpretation of religion, as much as it perverted the message of (or at least the message we attribute to) Jesus, even if not for the fact that a lot of ideologies actually used and abused Darwinian ideas, even if there weren't genocides long before Darwin's theories came onto the scene (many of which were doubtlessly inspired by religion), even if not for the fact that even if he was influenced, the idea that he would have to do anything would show a gross misinterpretation of Darwin on his part, and even if there weren't more "even ifs" I could write, this argument doesn't hold water because the argument holds no real value on its scientific truth. In the end, it should be noted that THERE IS A GOOD REASON PEOPLE DON'T TEACH INTELLIGENT DESIGN IN SCHOOLS, and it's for the same exact reason we don't teach psychologists to study the irregularities in people's skulls, or that very small solutions that often for all intents and purposes add up to little more than overpriced water is good pharmacology, it's because it's been thoroughly debunked. There's my review.

Band Name of the Day: The Casino of Life. From the Expelled movie, where they decide to put the odds at the first life forming.

Film Idea: Not an idea per se, but a list of some of the parallels that brought me to see how similar the movies Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas and Roman Holiday really were.
*Surprisingly, they are both 118 minutes long. This is, of course, a coincidence.
*In both films, the male lead is a journalist who is covering a story with an associate (in RH, a photographer, and in FLILV, his attourney.)
*These reporters end up traveling the city with their companions.
*Both of these reporters end up failing to publish the stories they were sent to write.
*Both of them end up spending much of the time pursuing their desires, in Peck's case, Audrey Hepburn, and in Thompson's case, "Every drug known to Civilized Man since 1544 AD."

Quote of the Day: "What Gods Don't You Believe in?"
_______________Ben Stein, Expelled. I hope that he was kidding when he asked this to Richard Dawkins, but I'm pretty sure he wasn't.

Link of the Day: Two entries ago, I forgot to link to this comic.

Tract Review: Papa. After watching the Pope's funeral, a man talks with his neighbor, who informs him about how Catholicism is somehow a continuation of the ancient Roman religion.