My husband is a music and youth minister. This past Sunday our youth group went to see the movie "Expelled - No Intelligence Allowed". We were really concerned the kids would get bored because of the documentary style but they enjoyed it! The premise of the movie is about the struggle between evolution theorists and the intelligent design movement.
"Expelled" is an incredible movie - I highly recommend it to anyone who values critical thinking and especially high school kids and college freshmen. Education is supposed to foster diversity of thought - it is mind boggling that scientists who talk about intelligent design are ostracized by the academic community and their fellow scientists. What happened to encouraging liberal critical thought? Where's ACLU on giving this scientists their rights to talk about intelligent design without being fired? Universities featured in the movie either fired or silenced the activities of their professors who questioned evolution or talked about intelligent design. The end of the movie is the most incredible part - it ties the whole evolution theory to worldviews such as naturalism and nihilism, the push for euthanasia and other cultures of death. The danger with evolutionary thought and the death culture, is that life is meaningless unless you are a perfect human specimen. It brings up the issue of 'Eugenics' which drives me nuts because it was invented to get rid of "lower" races and undesirables - the disabled, maimed, in today's world folks in a coma, unwanted unborn babies, senior citizens whose "quality of life" is lower etc. I've got a problem with that. I don't mind my son learning about the evolution theory, I want him to learn other theories and possibilities concerning the origin of life. I personally believe in intelligent design and the creation story - surprise, surprise!
I grew up in Africa and got offended at the implication that I descended from a monkey in biology classes. Granted, Kenya is a treasure mine for anthropologists and archeologists given all the fossils found in various locations and gorges. I wasn't even a Christian but I knew something was wrong with the monkey idea. In high school, we were taught both the evolution THEORY and creation stories including traditional tribal explanations for the beginning of man. We had a well rounded education system that allowed our minds to wander and explore various origin possibilities. That is what I find so infuriating about the education agenda in public high schools here. The movie EXPELLED, said it all - NO INTELLIGENCE ALLOWED. Here's where my confusion comes from - I thought being a scholar and a post-modern thinker means you consider others views not just your own. Most public campuses allow all sorts thought processes and 'liberalism' - as long as you don't mention "Intelligent Design". How restricting is that? I attended a research based university in Texas and my professors were die hard evolutionists. It drove me insane that they were so dogmatic without considering other possibilities.
The atheist professors interviewed in "Expelled" could not state how life began, one had the audacity to say "life began on the back of crystals" - WHAT? The other one who wrote a book on the 'God Delusion' could NOT say he was 100% certain about the lack of intelligent design! Allow kids and adults to think for themselves don't stifle ideas and diversity of thought. Go out and see "Expelled", Ben Stein did an incredible job interviewing scientists and visiting locations around the world. IT TAKES MORE FAITH TO BELIEVE IN EVOLUTION THAN SEEING A PATTERN OF INTELLIGENT DESIGN IN THE UNIVERSE.
