Re: The Washington Post "Dissing Darwian"

>I don't disagree with the Washington Post, in that "The Priviledged Planet"
>is religious--it offers a religious interpretation of excellent science,
>very clearly explained. (Remember, I speak about the book, since I have not
>yet seen the film version.) What I would wonder about, as others have been
>wondering, is the following.
>
>If a small amount of very clearly religious interpretation of science
>disqualifies a film from being scientifically respectable, then what about
>the whole series of films by Carl Sagan, "Cosmos." As many of us will
>remember, "Cosmos" was shown on PBS, used in lots of college and high school
>science classes--and still is used in those venues, though I probably much
>less often than it was 20 years ago. The opening lines of "Cosmos" are
>(in)famous for their explicit endorsement of materialism as a world view,
>and the implication that science requires such a conclusion is obvious to
>the viewer. Furthermore, the history of science/religion presented in
>"Cosmos" is simply appalling--one might say that it follows in the old
>Cornell tradition of AD White, which is to say as I just did that it is
>simply appalling. The historical stuff in "The Priviledged Planet" book is
>far more accurate, to say the least (I read some of it prior to publication
>and have seen all of it since publication).
>
>When will we see the Washington Post deny the scientific validity of
>"Cosmos"? When we do, I'll take their response to "The Priviledged Planet"
>more seriously.
>
>Ted

Ted,

I think you should say this in a letter to the Post.

Preston G.
Received on Fri Jun 3 19:56:01 2005