While trying to relax Saturday morning on our balcony, soaking up the summer sun, reading Saturday's papers, I stumbled upon this disturbing news
Next month the [Smithsonian Institution's National Museum of Natural History] will play host to a film intended to undercut evolution. The Discovery Institute, a group in Seattle that supports an alternative theory, “intelligent design,” is announcing on its Web site that it and the director of the museum “are happy to announce the national premiere and private evening reception” on June 23 for the movie, “The Privileged Planet: The Search for Purpose in the Universe.” The film is a documentary based on a 2004 book by Guillermo Gonzalez, an assistant professor of astronomy at Iowa State University, and Jay W. Richards, a vice president of the Discovery Institute, that makes the case for the hand of a creator in the design of Earth and the universe. News of the Discovery Institute's announcement appeared on a blog maintained by Denyse O'Leary, a proponent of the intelligent design theory, who called it “a stunning development.”
Here is my response to the Smithsonian (info@si.edu)
Hi, as a subscriber to your fine, science-based magazine, I was perturbed, and disappointed to read in Saturday's Yew York TImes (May 28th) that the Smithsonian is sponsoring a film about “Intelligent Design”, called “The Privileged Planet”. Please reconsider your position, I do not want to live in a theocracy, and movies like this do not advance the cause of humanity, they look backwards into the Dark Ages instead.I am not clamoring for you to 'cancel my subscription', but I do wish you would make a public statement supporting evolution.
Thank you,
Seth Anderson
---update, apparently Steve Gilliard read the same disturbing article.
Is the Smithsonian's reputation worth $16,000?Imagine this nonsense happening the American Museum of Natural History or British Museum.
update2: the New Yorker's H. Allen Orr examines Intelligent Design, and finds the reasoning a bit 'thin'.
Update3, the Smithsonian responds, here
{Film, Current Affairs, Personal}
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