'Dodos' to help mark Darwin birthday / LJWorld.com

Lawrence and Douglas county

J-W Staff Reports

January 19, 2007

Proponents of evolution are planning a birthday bash next month for Charles Darwin at the same time that the State Board of Education will be considering science standards that support evolution.

The celebration of Darwin - the father of the theory of evolution who was born Feb. 12, 1809 - will include a showing of the movie "Flock of Dodos" on Feb. 12 at Kansas University and a Darwin look-alike contest.

"Flock of Dodos" is a documentary that explores the recent science battles in Kansas and Dover, Pa., between mainstream scientists and proponents of intelligent design.

Much of the movie focuses on the 2005 decision in Kansas by the State Board of Education to adopt science standards that open evolution to criticism.

Those standards were approved by a 6-4 conservative majority. Last year, voters installed a 6-4 moderate majority, which has vowed to change the standards back to the ones supported by mainstream scientists.

The day after the screening of "Flock of Dodos," the State Board of Education may be voting to install those different science standards.

The movie, portions of which were shot in Lawrence, will be shown at 7:45 p.m. at Woodruff Auditorium in the Kansas Union. Tickets will be $2.

Other events surrounding Darwin's birthday are in the planning stages.

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emilyhadley (Emily Hadley) says…

Hooray!
January 19, 2007 at 11:41 a.m.
gr8dane (anonymous) says…

I want to see that Flock of Dodos...

Also of potential interest to anyone else who, like me, doesn't see science (including evolution) and faith as being incompatible, a large collection of churches around the USA are having "Evolution Sunday" again this year, at Darwin's birthday, February 11, 2007.

You can read more at:
http://www.butler.edu/clergyproject/r...
January 19, 2007 at 4:13 p.m.
Curious (anonymous) says…

Even those, like me, who consider evolution logically inane, do not "see science and faith as being incompatible."

Science became a discipline because the first, and succeeding, scientists believed God's creation was perfectly organized and could, and should, be studied.

True believers of evolution, I believe, are the only people who believe science and faith are incompatible. And they will shout it until everyone else is cowed. And then they will believe they have conquered. Like the bully in the neighborhood.
January 20, 2007 at 9:48 a.m.
gr8dane (anonymous) says…

Well, since evolution is an observed, well supported scientific fact, and the theory of evolution an excellent scientific explanation of the process, you do indeed see science and faith as being incompatible, even if you have twisted "science" in your own head to be only the parts of it that YOU want to accept, Curious.

Like the "Intelligent Design" movement of Creationists, who have their own theistic definition of science, and want it to eventually replace the secular one, as their "Wedge Document" showed.

They, and you, want to handicap science and destroy its credibility by removing one of its greatest enhancements, methodological naturalism, the assumption that things happen because of natural causes, leading to us finding out what they are, instead of assuming supernatural causes as ID creationists prefer.

Which is why it's ironic you consider evolutionary biology "logically inane". (You're welcome to try explaining how it is. So far I haven't heard one creationist successfully do so.)

And nice attempt to whine about the "bullies" of evolution, just because evolution is so well supported and accepted in the scientific community that you have to have your head up your butt to deny it today. There is a clear consensus in the scientific community that evolution is a factual process.

You guys are the bullies, trying to support your rejected alternative with politics and legal trickery and dishonest propaganda (like implying evolution is also a religion) because you can't get anywhere falsifying evolution or promoting your "alternative theory" using (real) scientific method. Which is why you want to change science to be theistically based.

Although yes, there are "bullies" of the sort you describe. I'd consider Richard Dawkins one of those (although he does know his stuff about biology). Strong anti-theists like him are not the majority, though. And they have more in common with you than the majority of so-called "evolutionists", like sharing the typical fallacy of false dichotomy, that you can believe in God OR science/evolution, but not both.
January 21, 2007 at 1:24 a.m.