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Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed (view source)
Revision as of 18:35, April 20, 2008
, 18:35, April 20, 2008no edit summary
The producers of ''Expelled'' responded with a lawsuit filed on April 14, 2008, seeking declaratory judgment that there is no copyright or other infringement. This lawsuit is currently unresolved.<ref>[http://biz.yahoo.com/bw/080415/20080415006769.html?.v=1] EXPELLED: No Intelligence Allowed Producers File Lawsuit and Expose Other Efforts to Suppress Free Speech</ref>
The producers of ''Expelled'' responded with a lawsuit filed on April 14, 2008, seeking declaratory judgment that there is no copyright or other infringement. This lawsuit is currently unresolved.<ref>[http://biz.yahoo.com/bw/080415/20080415006769.html?.v=1] EXPELLED: No Intelligence Allowed Producers File Lawsuit and Expose Other Efforts to Suppress Free Speech</ref>
== Criticism ==
The film has been accused of quote mining, namely in the section referring to Social Darwinism's link to the Holocaust. A quote by Charles Darwin's ''The Decent of Man'' was given in this form:
<blockquote>
With savages, the weak in body or mind are soon eliminated. We civilized men, on the other hand, do our utmost to check the process of elimination. We build asylums for the imbecile, the maimed and the sick. Thus the weak members of civilized societies propagate their kind. No one who has attended to the breeding of domestic animals will doubt that this must be highly injurious to the race of man. Hardly anyone is so ignorant as to allow his worst animals to breed.
</blockquote>
The quote however, was both severely edited and truncate to make it appear that Darwin was advocating eugenics. However, the full quote quickly refutes this notion:
<blockquote>
With savages, the weak in body or mind are soon eliminated; ''and those that survive commonly exhibit a vigorous state of health.'' We civilized men, on the other hand, do our utmost to check the process of elimination. We build asylums for the imbecile, the maimed and the sick; we institute poor-laws; ''and our medical men exert their utmost skill to save the life of every one to the last moment. There is reason to believe that vaccination has preserved thousands, who from a weak constitution would formerly have succumbed to small-pox. Thus the weak members of civilized societies propagate their kind.'' No one who has attended to the breeding of domestic animals will doubt that this must be highly injurious to the race of man. ''It is surprising how soon a want of care, or care wrongly directed, leads to the degeneration of a domestic race; but excepting in the case of man himself,'' hardly anyone is so ignorant as to allow his worst animals to breed.
The aid which we feel impelled to give to the helpless is mainly an incidental result of the instinct of sympathy, which was originally acquired as part of the social instincts, but subsequently rendered, in the manner previously indicated, more tender and more widely diffused. Nor could we check our sympathy, even at the urging of hard reason, without deterioration in the noblest part of our nature. The surgeon may harden himself whilst performing an operation, for he knows that he is acting for the good of his patient; ''but if we were intentionally to neglect the weak and helpless, it could only be for a contingent benefit, with an overwhelming present evil''.
</blockquote><ref>http://darwin-online.org.uk/content/frameset?viewtype=text&itemID=F937.1&pageseq=181</ref>
Ben Steins speech to the auditorium was done specifically for the film. Most of the crowd was extras, according to Michael Shermer, who was in the film.<ref>http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=ben-steins-expelled-review-michael-shermer</ref>
The film also completely omits Theistic Evolution, focusing on the polar opposites of atheism and religion. Mark Mathis, an associate editor of Expelled, when asked why prominent religious evolutionists such as Catholic Kenneth R. Miller were not in the film, he stated that his inclusion "would have confused the film unnecessarily."<ref>http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=a-conversation-with-mark-mathis</ref>