Ben Stein's Expelled - Part V

23 October 2007




Transcript available here.

My favorite part of the interview was this:

STEIN: Einstein worked within the framework of believing there was a God. Newton worked within the framework of believing there was a God. For gosh sakes Darwin worked within the framework of believing there was a God. And yet, somehow, today you're not allowed to believe it. Why can't we have as much freedom as Darwin had?

The big difference here is that Einstein didn't just say "light bends because God did it." Likewise, Newton didn't just say "gravity exists because God did it." Darwin didn't just say "different species are here because God did it," either. The fact that these men believed in the existence of God otherwise is completely irrelevant to the point Ben "persecution-complex" Stein is trying to make here. Their theories were good, and were backed up with evidence. They didn't just rely on divine fiat. As a result, they weren't laughed at in the scientific community. Even the Big Bang theory, although it has religious implications (insofar as it posits a beginning in time of the universe itself, and is thus compatible with religious beliefs), has been accepted because it presented significant evidence in its favor, and thus won over the scientific community.

Creationism, on the other hand, "works within the framework of believing there is a God" in a completely different manner. Its central argument is simply this: "things are so complex that God must have done it." It's the same old theological argument we've had floating around for centuries, but it's certainly not science, and it's certainly not on par with the theories of Newton and Einstein.

Part I, Part II, Part III, Part IV

No comments: