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Defend Science Commentary

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(March, 2008)
The Movie "Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed" - a big attack on Science
The Ben Stein movie/documentary "Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed" is scheduled for release on April 18th. The movie casts Stein (former Nixon speech-writer with a minor acting career) as an “anti-establishment rebel” facing off against “Big Science”. It is a crude attack on evolution, insidiously framed as defending the “Freedom of Speech” of scientists who dare to go up against the scientific establishment. P.Z. Myers, evolutionary biologist and author of the science blog Pharyngula, was recently expelled from a screening of the film (although his guest, Richard Dawkins, was not!) Myers, who was interviewed by the producers under false pretenses and appears in the film, immediately exposed the hypocrisy of the films producers who ejected a critical voice from the screening of a film purporting to be about freedom of speech. (See his blog
http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2008/03/expelled.php ). This, and other exposures of the film’s attack on evolution, created a firestorm in the blogosphere and brought the film some much needed criticism (check out the links below which give a general idea of the discussion). Here we aren’t going to repeat material well-covered elsewhere. (Here) ... we want to address some of the specific strategies of the film.
read the entire article...

(December, 2007)
The Stem Cell Breakthrough and the Attacks on Science
The week of Nov. 20, two teams of researchers -- one led by Kyoto University's Shinya Yamanaka, the other by the University of Wisconsin's Junying Yu reported that they had turned human skin cells into pluripotent stem cells – cells which appear to behave in tests so far the same as embryonic stem cells.

But the coverage of this story is being spun in ways that represent a serious attack on science.

At the core of this attack on science, an intense effort is being made to put over the pseudo-argument that since these pluripotent skin cells are “the same” as embryonic stem cells and since there's supposedly “a stigma” involved in embryonic stem cells, scientists should just drop them and “use” the skin cells instead because after all who wants controversy. And unfortunately many who should know better who are normally supporters of science have joined in pushing this viewpoint. read the entire article...

(February, 2007)
Attacks on Science From the Bush Administration Continue Post-Election (Excerpted from a speech in February 2007 in Hawaii by Michael Hadfield)
Lest anyone think that the Congressional electoral victories of the Democrats last November have changed anything, let me point out these post-election events, all drawn from the popular press since November 2006: read the entire article...

(November, 2006)
Assessing What is Going On Today
To say the attacks on science continue states the obvious. But Bush and the Republicans appear to be in political trouble, and there has been rising opposition to the attacks on science, including important victories. So how to assess what is going on? This article will examine this by focusing on the question that concentrates the overall assault on science and scientific thinking - the creationist attack on evolution. read the entire article...

(September, 2006)
On the Relation Between the Defend Science Statement and the UCS "Restoring Scientific Integrity" statement
An important question which is sometimes raised is why we are doing the Defend Science Statement and how we view the (UCS) "Restoring Scientific Integrity" Statement. Here we want to address this more fully, and also explain how we see our efforts as complementary and mutually reinforcing. read the entire article...

(February, 2006)
James Hansen, Global Warming, and the Bush Science Police
James Hansen, the top climate scientist with NASA, has come under intense pressure from high Bush administration officials threatening him and essentially telling him to shut up and be loyal to the President. They are demanding that he stop telling the truth about the grave dangers of global warming, and the urgent need for global action. Hansen has courageously refused to bow down to the threats and has continued to speak out. read the entire article...

(January, 2006)
Prof. Paul Mirecki (Univ. of Kansas) attacked for planning a course teaching "Intelligent Design" as religious myth. read the entire article...

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Articles

Scientific American: Bush-League Lysenkoism
The White House bends science to its will

Restoring Scientific Integrity
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Media coverage of Defend Science

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download A Very Incomplete List of Attacks on Science in 2007 ...

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Videos
If you watched these before, try again now. The video & audio quality is much improved. The presentations and discussion were very enlightening and well worth watching and sharing with friends/colleagues.
[Some people have reported problems using Internet Explorer with these video links. In our testing IE seems to freeze but is really just downloading a very large file and doesn't start playing until the download is finished - but then the video plays fine. Netscape seems to work fine if you have that. If you only have Internet Explorer, you can right click and save/download the video files to your local computer or just be very patient.]

Video of Defend Science Forum (UC Berkeley, 4/13/2006)
"The Attack on Scientific Thinking and Why We Must Defend Science"
video quality much improved!
Introduction (Jason Curtis / Mike Hadfield)
Dennis Baldocchi
Steve Palumbi
Kevin Padian
Q & A

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