A first-hand account of the 'EXPELLED' teleconference

3/28/2008 | 8:08 PM | Evolved Rationalist

"We're sick of being pushed around by the intelligentsia, although I'm one of the intelligentsia". ---Scientifically illiterate and arrogant fool Ben Stein

At 4pm today, I decided to waste an hour of my precious time to call in to Ben Stein's teleconference on the Expelled theistard mockumentary.

It started out with IDiots yapping about how much publicity their shitty movie has been receiving recently (conveniently ignoring the fact that most of the recent publicity has been negative) and claiming that 'Darwinism' is a modern-day witch hunt. (No, evolutionary biology is NOT 'Darwinism'). When was the last time you saw scientists burning the IDiots at the stake? As far as I know of, Michael Behe, for one, is a tenured professor at Lehigh. His publication record has been shitty since he went nutty, but he is still a tenured professor. The IDiots are obviously all about obfuscation, drama, lies and preaching to the choir. Epic fail.

Next was the usual 'Darwinism is Hitler is Nazism is Holocaust is eugenics is murder' tripe. Although that pile of dung is untrue, it would not have any bearing on the science of evolutionary biology if Hitler was an ardent fan of Darwin. Science does not work that way, and if they knew that, they wouldn't be IDiots. Next, Stein's droning voice came on, where he foamed about how he is a rebel who is going against the 'establishment', and after that he uttered what must now be his most infamous quote:

"We're sick of being pushed around by the intelligentsia, although I'm one of the intelligentsia". --Ben Stein, IDiot
Next, he uttered the same babble the YECs use about how he accepts microevolution but not macroevolution. (Yes, he needs remedial science lessons.) Next, he made me choke on my tea as he uttered his challenge to evolutionists: "Give me an example of a single mammalian species that has evolved through Darwinian evolution".

What the fuck is wrong with this IDiot?! Mammals evolved. Deal with it.

The lies didn't stop there. After receiving a question about the allegations that the IDiots interviewed scientists for the movie under false pretenses, and for a movie named 'Crossroads', Mathis lied by claiming that they didn't know the exact name of the movie at that time and were debating a few options. Sorry, Mathis. You fail at lying. He went on to accuse those who claim to be duped into being in the movie of slander and libel. Hmm...I wonder when the case will go to court.

*snicker*

After Stein again started drooling about eugenics and how the 'evidence is so clear' that Darwinism is linked to Nazism, Mathis decided to spin and lie about the recent Myers/Dawkins/Expelled debacle. After failing to salvage their grand shitshow of an epic fail, Mathis is now claiming that the RSVP site was only for 'certain groups' (ie. their church base), but the info leaked out to 'other groups' that were not invited.

Hypocrites! For all their talk about freedom of speech and how IDiots are being oppressed by evil atheist Darwinists, they admit to EXPELLING 'certain groups' from their movie screenings. These are the same people who link evolution to Hitler although they are the fucktarded theistards rambling about wanted and unwanted groups. They are desperate, muddled, and their true colors are getting more and more obvious as time goes by. Train wrecks are like that - you know it's going to get worse but you can't stop watching.

He went on about how he knew that PZ was going to be there and decided to expel him because he wanted to make a point. He then claimed that PZ advocated removing professors who are pro-ID from their positions. Mathis is either lying for his God Designer or was too ignorant to realize that PZ has clearly stated that Behe, as a tenured professor and as wrong as he is, can do he pleased. Lying fail again, Mathis. Your skills are not as good as you previously thought, huh?

The IDiots made a fuss about how Darwinists refuse to address the contents of the film itself. This is a lie as the key ideas in the film have been refuted, refuted again, and refuted yet again. The most important thing here is, how are 'Darwinists' supposed to address the contents of the film itself if they aren't allowed to watch the damn movie, and the apparently non-evil-Darwinists who do get invited to private screenings have to sign non-disclosure forms? Mathis was clearly on his lying-trainwreck mode during the teleconference.

Mathis then made another astounding statement about how there is so much fuss over evolution and how nobody makes this much fuss about gravity. Uh, Mathis, evolution has been accepted as a scientific fact by the scientific community the same way gravity is accepted as a scientific fact. The 'fuss' that you are talking about is in the public square, and it is because religious morons keep dragging this issue into the limelight by using whatever despicable methods they can think of. The last time I checked, there weren't ministries and un-museums devoted to denying gravity.

Strangely, I agreed with Mathis on one point(!). He said that this was not a scientific battle, but a battle of worldviews. He's got this right - there is no scientific debate about the fact that evolution happened. This whole culture war is because a large, deluded segment of the population yells about how science threatens their religious worldview. Bingo, Mathis.

Oh, and here is another gem by the IDiots:

"This film struck a huge blow to Richard Dawkins' career, but he could only ask about why PZ was expelled?"

WTF? Expelled struck a huge blow to Dawkins' career? When (if ever) will those retards get out of the gene pool?



Now, for the highlight of the teleconference, go over to PZ's.

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53 Comments

  1. John Quercus |

    Welcome back!! We've missed you!

     
  2. Scott Hatfield . . . . |

    Now appearing at a talk show near you!

     
  3. October Mermaid |

    This is just silly. Mathis and crew strike me as a bunch of six year olds, way too pleased with "argument techniques" that aren't nearly as clever as they seem to think.

    "People are talking about us! That's publicity, which is good, in your face! Hehe! I'm the greatest. Lalalalala I can't heaaaar you! Oh, and I could totally prove you wrong, but I don't have to! You know why you're wrong! Teehee!"

     
  4. John Murphy |

    Shalanonymous said: "What the fuck is wrong with this IDiot?! Mammals evolved. Deal with it."

    Now there's a well-reasoned argument!

    Oh...and speaking of well-reasoned arguments, Dawkins review of Behe's latest book "The Edge of Evolution" is a marvel of incredible refutation of the fact (speaking of facts) that our experience with malaria and sickle cell disease would imply that evolution beyond the species level is mathematically impossible by:

    1. Starting with an ad hominem attack
    2. Resorting to dog breeding to "refute" Behe's argument. Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, now THAT is funny.

    On the other hand, I did find an atheist who was actually willing to admit the logical end of atheism in regards to morality:

    "Well I will say the existence of matter itself (is the evidence). I will say the existence of morality. Myself and Richard Dawkins have a clearly different understanding of the origins of morality. I would say free will. If you’re an atheist, if you’re an atheist logically speaking you cannot believe in objective morality. You cannot believe in free will. These are two things that the vast majority of humankind implicitly believe in. We believe for example that if a person carries out a bad action, we can call that person bad because we believe that they are freely choosing those actions. … And just quickly an atheist believes we are controlled completely by our genes and make no free actions at all."

    David Quinn

     
  5. Boo |

    Someone needs to confront Sein with his claim to accept "microevolution" combined with his insistence that evolution leads to Nazism and ask him why, according to his own logic, he is a Nazi. After all, Hitler and crowd were trying to create improvements in the human species- microevolution.

     
  6. Torbjörn |

    If Ben Stein is "one of the intelligentsia", it is AFAIU only because he has inveigled himself into some magazines on economics and its history, something he seems to catastrophically bad in.

    Btw, Mathis is wrong about gravitation too, as someone pointed out. It is well known that general relativity is an effective theory (i.e. only applicable for relatively low energies), not a fundamental one. And the fact that it doesn't include quantum theory is another hint at this.

    At the same time MET has none of that baggage.

    @ John Murphy:

    Now there's a well-reasoned argument!

    It's enough in the case of an accepted science. You don't go about asking for specific examples in other theories, do you? For example, "prove that gravitation works by calculating a projectile trajectory for me".

    If you are curious, you can look up specific examples and its research everywhere, say Wikipedia or Talkorigins. Some beautiful examples of lineages are well known.

    speaking of well-reasoned arguments, Dawkins review of Behe's latest book

    So that is what Mathis means by "address the contents", that we can move the goalposts to the other side? Actually you creationists have a point, as a scientific theory covering the same claim that a pseudoscientific cabal makes effectively debunks the later claim.

    But when we have to understand why Mathis and Stein made the movie at all if they already concede the rational argument. Which is simple of course: they don't make a rational argument, they make an emotional one - "science is wrong if it has consequences". As the post points out, it is both factually wrong (false premise) and logically wrong (false conclusion).

    free will

    Philosophy has no bearing on the validity of science any more than consequences or anti-science rantings.

     
  7. Torbjörn |

    After all, Hitler and crowd were trying to create improvements in the human species- microevolution.

    You have a good point, but we should also point out that at the same time selection is an example of an evolutionary mechanism and has measurable evolutionary effects, it isn't full blown evolution.

    Using only selection will decrease variation. (IANAB, but AFAIU over large parts of the genome, selective sweeps, by linkage effects.) It is unsustainable, which breeders eventually find out, and large scale eugenics is ultimately a politics that is not supported by evolution.

    The converse case is actually true, the old and well known use of artificial selection shows both a mechanism of evolution and inspired the theory in the first place. Though as I have recently come to understand, it may ironically also be the case that Darwin was inspired by Paley's watchmaker example to appreciate apparent design and that it must have a scientific explanation.

    So if MET is bad by consequences and itself is a consequence of Paleyism it means that by creationist reasoning creationism is bad.

    Bad, bad creationism!

     
  8. creationist |

    The point here is that the Darwinist Shalini was being unethical when she sneaked into the ID teleconference to spew her hate on this hate site.

    Thanks for proving our point, Shalini!!!!

     
  9. Anonymous |

    Shalini is not a Darwinist.

    http://www.evolvedrational.com/2008/02/i-am-not-darwinist.html

     
  10. monado |

    Anonyymous,
    If microevolution is a fact and macroevolution mathematically can't occur, how did we get here? Magic? Oh, yeah, right, that is what you think.

    Two hundred years ago, people had seen enough real-world evidence to convince them that evolution had occurred. They worried at the problem for fifty years until Darwin, Alfred Wallace, and some other people suggested a plausible mechanism. And for the next 150 years, we've been testing and confirming it.

    About forty years later, Darwin's theory was in crisis because no-one knew the mechanism of inheritance. Gregor Mendel's work was rediscovered simultaneously by three different people. That formed the basis of a new synthesis, which has been robust since then.

    Now we can sequence DNA and trace detailed lines of descent, confirming the conclusions derived from macroscopic evidence such as fossil evidence and anatomy.

    People who understand evolution are not "Darwinists" any more than people who design electronics are "Voltaists."

     
  11. monado |

    Sorry, I meant to address that to "creationist."

    Scott, thanks for listening to that load of dreck for the rest of us.

     
  12. monado |

    Apologies again. Thanks, Evolved and Rational.

     
  13. creationist |

    Shalini is a GATECRASHER just like PZ MEYERS!!

     
  14. Efrique |

    "This film struck a huge blow to Richard Dawkins' career, but he could only ask about why PZ was expelled?"

    WTF? Expelled struck a huge blow to Dawkins' career?


    Hahaha. These fucks are so crazy. Lies drool out of their mouths so often they must no longer have any sense that anything even can be true.

    So which career is it they think they're referring to?

    He retired from his college at Oxford after reaching the college's mandatory retirement age. A decades-long academic career comes to its natural and distinguished end - age retirement. Talk about cutting a career off in its youth!

    So unless the IDists claim they caused Dawkins to somehow be born earlier and so reach retirement age sooner, they had no impact there.

    Must be that they think they've ruined his writing career.

    No wait, he just sold his next book for 3 million or something like that. Yep, there's a ruined career I wouldn't mind having.

    His speaking career? Except he was in the US speaking when he attended the Expelled screening.

    Sorry, I can figure out which deluded lie they're trying to tell here. Probably they can't either. It's just all lies for Jesus, all the time.

     
  15. creationist |

    Shalini, why did you GATECRASH???

    Darwinists crash into a private conference to persecute creationists!!!!

    Shalini is an evil Darwinist!!!

     
  16. creationist |

    We are being persecuted by Darwinists like Shalini!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

     
  17. sciencefreak |

    Creationist, stop being a dick and stop spamming. This site has nothing to do with Shalini.

     
  18. The Watcher |

    What's the matter, Creationist? Are you afraid of "teaching both sides?"

     
  19. creationist |

    The matter is that Shalini gatecrashed. It's not right, and Darwinists like her are claiming that we are being dishonest!!! Liar!!!

     
  20. Cetacea |

    Ah, Creationist... I'm finding it very hard for me to believe that you're not really an evolutionist who's being satirical.

    "Shalini is a GATECRASHER just like PZ MEYERS!!"

    Seriously. It's not funny. Shut up about this entirely unrelated blogger being Shalini or present whatever crummy evidence you've got.

    Call PZ and Dawkins gatecrashers all you want. The makers of Expelled are just demonstrating their personal desire to control information even though they're making a film making it seem like the evolutionists are controlling information.

    "We are being persecuted by Darwinists like Shalini!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

    Go ahead and whine about being 'persecuted'. The evolutionists are the ones who are having lies spread about them in this well-funded propaganda film.

     
  21. creationist |

    This is Shalini's FAMOUS writing style this proves it okay, you Darwinist liars!! I have evidence, now why the gatecrash??

    I am a scientist at AiG!

     
  22. Evolved Rationalist |

    Creationist, you need to get back on your meds. You're getting delirious.

     
  23. Cetacea |

    "This is Shalini's FAMOUS writing style this proves it okay, you Darwinist liars!!"

    Wow. Your proof is so rock solid! It's not circumstantial in any way whatsoever! And the fact that you're an AiG scientist makes it all the more credible. I believe you, AiG scientist!

    Typical of AiG... convinced by such the crappiest evidence.

     
  24. creationist |

    This is my evidence:

    1. The theistard word
    2. Gene pool Nazi Darwinism!!!!
    3. Science worshipping
    4. Arrogant Darwinist Shalini!!!!!!

     
  25. Cetacea |

    1. The theistard word
    ... is a meme.
    2. Gene pool Nazi Darwinism!!!!
    Evolved and Rational is a Nazi? Shalini was a Nazi? You need evidence for THIS as well.
    3. Science worshipping
    Heh. I worship science too. I guess I must be Shalini.
    4. Arrogant Darwinist Shalini!!!!!!
    Granted, Evolved and Rational is arrogant (sorry) but so are loads of other bloggers.

     
  26. Evolved Rationalist |

    When I feel like smashing my head against the wall due to extreme stupidity from the theistarded anti-science side, I think:

    With enemies like these, who needs friends?

    *snicker*

    Poor cretin. Are your meds too mild? How about asking your lawwd gawwd to cure you?

    Oh, wait - he doesn't exist. My bad.

    *double snicker*

     
  27. creationist |

    This blog is too ANTI-GOD!! Darwinism is anti-God!! Look, this is Shalini Sehkar's arrogant blasphemy!! Don't deny it!! Nobody else has theistard, arrogance, anti-God and Darwinism Nazi in one!!!!!!!!

     
  28. Evolved Rationalist |

    Creationist, where the fuck is your evidence for all of that? Put up, shut up, or ram your Buy-bull and a brick up your ass. Sideways.

     
  29. creationist |

    SEE!!! THIS IS EVIDENCE!!! That is Shalini's writing style not Evolved hahahaha YOU ARE CAUGHT hahahaha!!!

     
  30. Anonymous |

    Dude, stop spamming.

     
  31. Cetacea |

    "This blog is too ANTI-GOD!! Darwinism is anti-God!! Look, this is Shalini Sehkar's arrogant blasphemy!! Don't deny it!! Nobody else has theistard, arrogance, anti-God and Darwinism Nazi in one!!!!!!!!"

    Wow... Whatever reason a person can possibly have while being a creationist at the same time has been lost.

    I'm going to ignore the Nazi stuff but you really need to end your obsession with Shalini. The moment you go to other blogs you see her all over the place. I think that you'll find that her blog and this blog is not the only blog that is pro-evolution and pro-atheism.

    http://planetatheism.com/

     
  32. creationist |

    http://planetatheism.com/author/shalini/

    BUSTED!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

     
  33. Anonymous |

    Can we all get back on topic, please? Why does it matter what someone's real name is here? Stick to the arguments, Creationist.

     
  34. Cetacea |

    Um... Shalini's old blog posts... the most recent of which is January of this year. Yup. She's definitely still blogging.

     
  35. creationist |

    Shalini EXPOSED!!

     
  36. creationist |

    No, they are SIMILAR and the SAME, the one about my organizations' RESEARCH JOURNAL!!!!!!!!!!!!

     
  37. Cetacea |

    *sigh*

    And now you've resorted to babbling nonsensically.

    Somebody call the men in white coats... Help this poor soul.

     
  38. creationist |

    Since nobody is listening to me here, yes it is SHALINI SEHKAR EXPOSED, I will start a blog to EXPOSE this lunatic mad DArwinist science worshipper of a LIAR for SCIENCE PERSECUTION to expose HER LIES!!

     
  39. jacques |

    Hey creationist, what is the scientific theory of creationism?

     
  40. Cetacea |

    *sigh*

    Have fun with that. I have no objections to alleged AiG scientists wasting time that they could be spending polluting young minds. That is... if you are one...

     
  41. Evolved Rationalist |

    Cretinous theistard, what makes you think that my real name is 'Shalini Sehkar'? Why don't you provide some evidence to your inane claims?

    **I have a really liberal comment policy here, but further incoherant rantings from 'creationist' on this 'real name' issue will be deleted unless he/she/it comes up with actual evidence. Stop spamming and stick to the damn topic, will you, creationist?**

     
  42. creationist |

    Fine, I will leave, but I know the truth. I will pray for you. When I first heard that Shalini closed Scientia Natura I wished she died and went to hell to pay for all her blasphemy but I cannot stand that she is still here now LYING and GATECRASHING!!!!!!!!!!

    Evolved Rationalist, you are just like Richard Dawkins, deserve each other!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

     
  43. Evolved Rationalist |

    Evolved Rationalist, you are just like Richard Dawkins

    Thanks for the compliment, creationist! This is an encouraging step forward for you. Keep it up, and you may be one day free from all your anti-science delusions.

     
  44. Cetacea |

    "Evolved Rationalist, you are just like Richard Dawkins, deserve each other!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

    Oh, how I wish somebody would say that about me. :P

     
  45. creationist |

    What compliment????????????????????????

     
  46. Anonymous |

    http://tinyurl.com/2ttw45

     
  47. Cetacea |

    "What compliment????????????????????????"

    What is it with you and excessive punctuation????????????????????????

     
  48. Torbjörn |

    Sometimes I wish I could hate all creationists the way they hate skeptics.

    But somehow I mostly end up feeling sorry for them.

     
  49. Rev. Reed Braden |

    How could E&R be Shalini? I'm Shalini!

    No! I'm Spartacus!

    No!! I'm Spartacus!

    I'm Spartacus!

     
  50. Anonymous |

    Great post!

     
  51. Anonymous |

    Good coverage. To add to the report, I recommend reading this account as well. http://lifewithoutfaith.com

     
  52. Peter Dawson Buckland |

    Brilliant recap.

     
  53. monado |

    "Huge blow to Dawkins' career?" That explains why Dawkins just got a $350,000 advance for his next book while Behe's latest, "The Edge of Evolution," is in the bargain bin and remaindered at Amazon. Yes, they're advertising a new low price and explaining that there's just a small mark on the book from the publisher. That's the remaindered mark, which means, "We can't unload this flop at the original price."

     

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