Thursday, September 17, 2009

The triumph of anti-intellectualism

From USA Today

The British producer of Creation, a film about Charles Darwin, says he has not been able to secure a U.S. distributor because the evolution theory is too controversial for American audiences, The Daily Mail reports.

The film, starring Paul Bettany and Oscar-winner Jennifer Connelly, opened the Toronto International Film Festival last week.

Producer Jeremy Thomas says the film has been picked up in almost every country in the world and that he finds it "unbelievable" that the topic remains a "hot potato" in the USA.
Wonderful.

A country born out of the Enlightenment, founded by people for whom democracy was an outgrowth of a scientific rationalist outlook, can't find a distibutor for a biography about a man who co-discovered one of the most profound realizations in human history. A man rivaled in scientific significance only by Newton, Einstein, and the Copernican revolution.

Yet anti-scientific religious propagnda has no problem getting distributed.

'Wandering in a vast forest at night, I have only a faint light to guide me. A stranger appears and says to me: "My friend, you should blow out your candle in order to find your way more clearly." This stranger is a theologian.' - Denis Diderot, Pensées philosophiques (1746)

Yep.

Check out the film's interactive site. You can view that in the US, at least.

See here for Eugenie Scott's review.

1 comment:

Grung_e_Gene said...

It's akin to Chicago Cubs fans saying the Cubs are the best team when 101 years with no Series wins don't back the claim.