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42 of 44 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
21St CENTURY SCOPES TRIAL: DARWIN: 40 INTELLIGENT DESIGN: 0 (ID STRIKES OUT), July 31, 2007
This review is from: 40 Days and 40 Nights: Darwin, Intelligent Design, God, OxyContin®, and Other Oddities on Trial in Pennsylvania (Hardcover)
Not since early Hunter S. Thompson or Tom Wolfe have I had as much fun reading a witty, provocative piece of journalistic writing as I've had in screenwriter Matthew Chapman's "40 Days and 40 Nights: Darwin, Intelligent Design, GOD, OxyContin AND OTHER Oddities ON TRIAL IN Pennsylvania". It's an enthralling, often humorous tome, that owes more to the mordant humor of Frank McCourt, in his bestselling memoirs "Angela's Ashes" and "Teacher Man", than it does to the rather dry, but never dull, prose of Chapman's great-great-grandfather, Charles Darwin, in his scientific classic, "Origin of Species". In the fall of 2005, Chapman attended the Kitzmiller vs. Dover Area School District Trial, as an accredited journalist and filmmaker, intent on making a documentary film on the trial, the town and its people. However, this would soon become a personal trek of self-reflection and discovery, in which he would make a most remarkable conclusion on the teaching of creationism in science classrooms. A trek which took him back to Dover, PA often, holding substantive conversations with the key players on both sides of the issue. And while Chapman truly strives for a cinematic narrative, fading in and out between brief discussions of the 20th Century Scopes Trial, the Discovery Institute, and his illustrious ancestor's revolutionary scientific research, the book's emphasis remains focused upon himself and his conversations with the people of Dover. So those in search of an extensive, truly profound, overview of the trial's origins and history might be best served elsewhere, most notably by reading Edward Humes' definitive, well-written account of the trial in his book "Monkey Girl: Evolution, Education, Religion, and the Battle for America's Soul", but they would miss much of the personal drama that Chapman has vividly recorded, using his prose as though it was his video camera lens, exquisitely recording all of the detail present. Chapman's narrative is more linear in focus than Humes' comprehensive account, and adheres more closely to a chronological perspective. One that starts with the Dover Area School District board's decision in the fall of 2004 to teach Intelligent Design alongside evolution, unexpectedly starting a civil war within the town itself, led by the ardent Fundamentalist Christians on the board, against those in the Dover community who were appalled by the board's decision. Among the most sympathetic figures is unexpectedly the board's firebrand, Bill Buckingham, who ruefully admits to Chapman that he's addicted to the painkiller OxyContin, and blames it, not himself, for some of his most outlandish comments, at the board's meetings, that were reported accurately by the local press. Chapman's truly moving, poignant portrayal of him strongly hints that he is, indeed, a lost soul afflicted by drug addiction. It is through moving portraits like those of Buckingham, and his arch-nemesis, former board member Barrie Callahan, that we get a strong sense of the political and religious strife which embroiled the people of Dover for more than a year, beginning in the summer of 2004, when the board left the Dover High School science teachers twisting in the wind, simply because Buckingham had objected to the teaching of "Darwinism" - and that mentioned only briefly - in the newest edition of a popular high school textbook co-authored by Brown University cell biologist Kenneth R. Miller, who, himself, is the subject of a sympathetic portrayal by Chapman in which he explains the rationale for science's faithful adherence against "dealing with issues of meaning or purpose" during his court testimony. However, it isn't Kenneth R. Miller who emerges as the hero of Chapman's vividly told tale. Instead, the honors rest upon the attorneys for the plaintiffs, most notably, lead attorney Eric Rothschild, and, quite unexpectedly, philosopher of science Barbara Forrest. Rothschild is depicted as a most congenial, yet still quite, astute, legal warrior in the courtroom, who is able to pry gently from leading Intelligent Design advocate - and star defense witness - Lehigh University biochemist Michael Behe a surprising admission that astrology could be viewed as scientific, based on Behe's own broad definition of what science is, one that includes the potential study of supernatural phenomena; a definition which runs counter to the one subscribed to by the National Academy of Sciences and mainstream science: a rational enterprise that is completely divorced from the supernatural realm (During this memorable "duel" of a cross-examination between Rothschild and Behe, Chapman observes Behe "smiling defiantly" as Rothschild reads the infamous disclaimer posted on the website of Lehigh University biological sciences department acknowledging evolution's scientific validity, but noting too Behe's academic freedom to pursue "research" on Intelligent Design. He draws the conclusion that Behe feels intense pain from this rejection by his own departmental colleagues.). Chapman demonstrates why philosopher Barbara Forrest may have been the plaintiffs' most effective witness. Led on by attorney Rothschild, she begins her testimony with an elegant overview of the history of the creationism, especially during the last two decades of the 20th Century, emphasizing the origins and early history of the "Intelligent Design" movement. And then she reveals the pivotal "smoking gun" in an accurate, yet dramatic fashion, documenting the text changes made in the early drafts of the Intelligent Design textbook "Of Pandas and People", noting the ample instances in which "creation" was substituted with "design", not scores of times, but at least more than one hundred different instances in the text itself. Later, she ends her testimony in a memorably tedious cross-examination by lead defense attorney Richard Thompson that drags on for nearly a day and a half. Chapman concludes "40 Days and 40 Nights" on a most idiosyncratic, personal note, and one that he has alluded to ever since the very first page of his memoir. He contends that we should allow creationism into the science classroom, so that it can be "dissected", in much the same fashion as it was during the Kitzmiller vs. Dover Area School District trial, by allowing teachers to "explore the limitations of faith through the revelatory methods of science", and resulting in "verdicts" identical to Republican Federal Judge Jones' conclusion that Intelligent Design wasn't scientific. Emotionally, it is a sentiment that I found myself quite unexpectedly, at first, to be in complete agreement. However, on second thought, I concur with Ken Miller's observation that introducing Intelligent Design into science classrooms would be a "science stopper". It would conflate most students' understanding of what exactly is the difference between religious faith and science, though I suppose that some truly gifted students, like those attending prominent American high schools such as Alexandria, Virginia's Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology, and New York City's Bronx High School of Science and Stuyvesant High School, might readily understand and appreciate these distinctions. And yet I am inclined to agree more with the harsh view articulated by distinguished British paleontologist Richard Fortey in his essay published in the January 30, 2007 issue of the British newspaper Telegraph, contending that it is an absolute waste of time arguing with Intelligent Design advocates, and that they ought to be dismissed as "IDiots"; by extension, so would be the teaching of Intelligent Design alongside evolution in a science classroom. I would rather see talented students from Thomas Jefferson, Bronx Science and Stuyvesant engage themselves fruitfully in genuine scientific research of the highest caliber, than in trying to understand the metaphysical, religious nonsense known as Intelligent Design and other flavors of creationism. I think, in hindsight, so would Charles Darwin.
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18 of 18 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
America, Truth, God, and the Constitution, May 16, 2007
This review is from: 40 Days and 40 Nights: Darwin, Intelligent Design, God, OxyContin®, and Other Oddities on Trial in Pennsylvania (Hardcover)
What Matthew Chapman has written is an account of a trial and a report of an America suffering from a widening cultural gap between the secular protections of the constitution and a segment of the population who want to press a Christian agenda in public institutions. Richard Feynman, the physicist, in characterizing the aim of science and the aim of religion said that science seeks to uncover immutable laws that can predict events. The inverse square law of gravitation, laws of motion, and the effect of acceleration on mass, once revealed, changed how the universe is understood. Scientific method postulates a theory and then tests it, always open to new facts that will refine it. Oppositely, religion formulates opinions as dogma that, like conspiracy theory, is not accountable to fact. Dogma resists information that would compromise its premise. As long as science could not explain phenomenon, religion took as its providence superstitious understanding and assigned the mysteries of the world to an all-knowing God, who spoke to human creatures through inspired texts interpreted by anointed priests and ministered to the uneducated. Little has changed in the process of religious knowing, but much has changed in scientific understanding. In this compelling report of a forty-day trial, arguments are heard for and against the inclusion of a textbook describing Intelligent Design as an alternative to evolutionary theory in a ninth grade science class at Dover High School in Pennsylvania. The board of education voted the text into the curriculum and several parents who objected, claimed that the content was religiously driven, scientifically invalid, and legally unconstitutional. They won the case, but not before an exhausting, and by turns boring, shocking, outrageous, bigoted, benighted and ridiculous sequence of witnesses had their say in a formal court of law. It will serve no purpose here to comment on the obdurate convictions of religious people who are simple-minded, except to say that anyone can have an opinion, and everybody does, but an opinion is worthless unless it comports with reality. People in asylums have opinions, but it would be foolish to account any weight to them. In Mr. Chapman's narrative, science represents reality, and in Judge Jones's court, reality obtained. It's hard to know what opponents of Darwin fear especially. The loss of God from their world is part of it, or more to the evangelical point, the loss of God from your world, which good Christians find hard to countenance. But more fundamentally, dread screams from their intolerance and zeal from a possible awareness of the cosmic fraud in all of it. Matthew Chapman quotes Mark Twain: "Faith believes something you know ain't true." The constitutional rights framed by the wise fathers of our country stand as a barrier against extremism. In our day religious belief systems are collapsing under the weight of their absurdity. A world view seething in prejudice, misapprehension, sexual phobia and violence handed down to our day from desert kingdoms of the late bronze age is not relevant to what science has learned about the universe within and without since then.
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17 of 17 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Like a box of chocolates: tasty, and with lots of nuts, July 4, 2007
This review is from: 40 Days and 40 Nights: Darwin, Intelligent Design, God, OxyContin®, and Other Oddities on Trial in Pennsylvania (Hardcover)
This book is about the famous Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School Board case. The school board, controlled by science-illiterate, religious fanatics and following the advice of other, science-illiterate, religious fanatics at the Thomas More Law Center, overruled Dover High's own science faculty and forced through a policy mandating that the freshman biology course include a statement that misrepresented and criticized evolutionary theory and provided information about an untested creationist alternative called "intelligent design." (Intelligent design is a "scientific" theory whose primary advocates are yet another bunch of religious kooks at the Discovery Institute.) After the school board passed that policy, several parents sued, alleging that the policy violated the First Amendment's provision regarding separation of church and state. After a full trial, the court eventually ruled that, duh, ID was a religious theory and had no place in science class. The book has three main ingredients. The trial itself serves as the unifying theme for the book, so the first ingredient, of course, is a description of the courtroom action, including very brief summaries of some of the testimony of the experts for both plaintiffs and defendants on the main points of the trial. Chapman does comment on some of the technical aspects of the trial, but only occasionally and very briefly. In general there is very little analysis of the merits of the scientific, legal, or philosophical arguments that both sides presented, so if you're looking for detailed information about those issues, you may want to look elsewhere. The second ingredient is a brief summary chapter in which Chapman argues in favor of teaching creationism/ID in science classes. The book's third and most important ingredient is the "human interest" or background stories about many of the characters on both sides of the tragicomedy of the trial; and it is this ingredient that makes the book such a tasty read. The anecdotes and revealing glimpses into the personalities, backgrounds, and motivations of the main actors are generally presented with warmth, sensitivity, and, frequently, with a great deal of humor. Many of the anecdotes were downright hilarious. Unfortunately, several anecdotes were of a more disturbing nature. The anecdotes revealing the dishonesty of the board members and the hypocrisy of the Thomas More Law Center will probably not be surprising to anyone who has followed the evo/crevo dispute in any detail, but the reports about the school board's arrogant, religious bigotry may be shocking simply for how open and public it was. The cowardice of the Discovery Institute's William Dembski and Stephen Meyer in failing to testify was also interesting, and Dick Carpenter's unexplained disappearance was simply mystifying. (Carpenter is associated with Focus on the Family, another group of religious cranks.) Other anecdotes report on the school board members' appalling lack of intellectual curiosity about the changes they were making to the science curriculum. That will probably not surprise anyone who has followed the dispute in any detail either, since many of the pro-ID statements from school officials in Kansas a couple of years ago were just as appallingly ignorant. The vicious hate mail and personal attacks that the plaintiffs and their school-age children endured show once again that freedom isn't free. In sharp contrast to Dembski's and Meyer's cowardice, the plaintiffs showed a lot of courage in standing up to the religious bullies on the school board and in the local pulpits. If the Christian God is indeed a God of love, then some of those clergymen are going to have to answer some day for their hateful actions and comments. Again, if you're looking for detailed, technical analyses of any part of the evo/crevo debate or a formal, historical treatment of the trial, this book is probably not going to satisfy you, but the human interest stories in this book are truly a feast. P.S. Even if you don't buy the book, at least take a look at the inside jacket cover. The picture of Chapman is hilarious.
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