Flock of Dodos

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Flock of Dodos: The Evolution-Intelligent Design Circus
Directed by Randy Olson
Written by Randy Olson
Produced byTy Carlisle
Music byAmotz Plessner
Distributed byNew Video (US Home Video), Documentary Educational Resources (International)
Release date
  • 2006 (2006)
Running time
84 minutes
CountryUnited States
LanguageEnglish

Flock of Dodos: The Evolution-Intelligent Design Circus is a documentary film by American marine biologist and filmmaker Randy Olson. It highlights the debate between proponents of the concept of intelligent design and the scientific evidence and consensus that supports evolution, as well as the potential consequences of science rejection.

Contents

The documentary was first screened publicly on February 2, 2006, in Kansas, where much of the public controversy on intelligent design began, as well as the starting point of discussion in the documentary. Other public screenings followed in universities, including Harvard and Stony Brook University, marking the celebration of Charles Darwin's birthday.

Synopsis

Flock of Dodos examines the disagreements that proponents of intelligent design have with the scientific consensus position of evolution. Olsen also expressed concerns in relation to the potential to distrust and reject science in general. [1]

The evolutionarily famous dodo (Raphus cucullatus) is a now-extinct bird that lived on the island of Mauritius. Due to its lack of fear of humans and inability to fly, the dodo was easy prey, and thus became known for its apparent stupidity.

The film attempts to determine who the real "dodos" are in a constantly evolving world: the scientists who are failing to effectively promote evolution as a scientifically accepted fact, the intelligent design advocates, or the American public who get fooled by the "salesmanship" of evolution critics. The film gives equal air time to both sides of the argument, including intelligent design proponent Michael Behe and several of his colleagues.

While Randy Olson ultimately sides with the scientists who accept evolution, the scientists are criticized for their elitism and inability to efficiently present science to the general public, which ultimately contributes to the spread of misconceptions. [2]

The film begins by going over the history of intelligent design thought from Plato and Paley to the present-day incarnation promoted by the Discovery Institute. Olson mixes in humorous cartoons of squawking dodos with commentary from his mother and interviews with proponents on both sides of the intelligent design/evolution debate.

On the intelligent design side, Olson interviews Behe, John Calvart (founder of the Access Research Network) and a member of the Kansas school board. [3] Olson also unsuccessfully tries to interview Kansas Board of Education member Connie Morris (associated with Kansas evolution hearings) and members of the Discovery Institute.

Release

The documentary premiered at the Tribeca Film Festival in New York, in April 2006, [4] and since then has played at film festivals all over the U.S. and abroad. The documentary was shown in museums and universities as part of a "Dodos Darwin Day" event (celebrating Charles Darwin's birthday) on or around February 12, 2007. Flock of Dodos: the Evolution-Intelligent Design Circus is currently (as of January 2008) in rotation on Showtime in the US and available on DVD. [5]

The documentary was praised by the journal Nature [6] and a variety of other publications. [7] [8]

In 2007, Olson released a collection of "pulled punches," of unreleased material that he chose to leave out that reflected poorly on intelligent design supporters. [9]

Discovery Institute response

Olson invited the Discovery Institute, a hub of the intelligent design movement, to appear in the film. Instead the institute responded by creating a website, Hoax of Dodos, characterizing the documentary as "revisionist history," and a "hoax" filled with inaccuracies and misrepresentations. [10]

Biologist PZ Myers responded to the institute's "bogus complaint that Olson was lying in the movie" about Ernst Haeckel's drawings of embryos is false. [11] Myers explained the drawings have not been used in recent biology textbooks "other than a mention that once upon a time Haeckel came up with this idea of ontogeny recapitulating phylogeny." Myers and other critics of intelligent design have shown that each of these texts treats Haeckel's theory of ontogeny recapitulating phylogeny as an example of an outdated exaggeration. [11] Myers notes in his rebuttal of the criticism from design proponents that, "I would add that progress in evolutionary biology has led to better explanations of the phenomenon that vertebrate embryos go through a period of similarity: it lies in conserved genetic circuitry that lays down the body plan." [11]

In early 2007, in response to Olson's claim, "the Discovery Institute is truly the big fish in this picture, with an annual budget of around $5 million," the Institute responded that their budget is only $4.2 million, and that they spend close to $1 million per year funding intelligent design. [10] [12]

Related Research Articles

Intelligent design Pseudoscientific argument for the existence of God

Intelligent design (ID) is a pseudoscientific argument for the existence of God, presented by its proponents as "an evidence-based scientific theory about life's origins". Proponents claim that "certain features of the universe and of living things are best explained by an intelligent cause, not an undirected process such as natural selection." ID is a form of creationism that lacks empirical support and offers no testable or tenable hypotheses, and is therefore not science. The leading proponents of ID are associated with the Discovery Institute, a Christian, politically conservative think tank based in the United States.

Michael Behe American biochemist, author, and intelligent design advocate

Michael J. Behe is an American biochemist, author, and advocate of the pseudoscientific principle of intelligent design (ID). He serves as professor of biochemistry at Lehigh University in Pennsylvania and as a senior fellow of the Discovery Institute's Center for Science and Culture. Behe is best known as an advocate for the validity of the argument for irreducible complexity (IC), which claims that some biochemical structures are too complex to be explained by known evolutionary mechanisms and are therefore probably the result of intelligent design. Behe has testified in several court cases related to intelligent design, including the court case Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District where his views were cited in the ruling that intelligent design is not science and is religious in nature.

<i>Icons of Evolution</i> Book by Jonathan Wells

Icons of Evolution is a book by Jonathan Wells, an advocate of the pseudoscientific intelligent design argument for the existence of God and fellow of the Discovery Institute, in which Wells criticizes the paradigm of evolution by attacking how it is taught. The book includes a 2002 video companion. In 2000, Wells summarized the book's contents in an article in the American Spectator. Several of the scientists whose work is sourced in the book have written rebuttals to Wells, stating that they were quoted out of context, that their work has been misrepresented, or that it does not imply Wells's conclusions.

Kenneth R. Miller American biologist

Kenneth Raymond Miller is an American cell biologist and molecular biologist, currently Professor of Biology and Royce Family Professor for Teaching Excellence at Brown University. Miller's primary research focus is the structure and function of cell membranes, especially chloroplast thylakoid membranes. Miller is a co-author of a major introductory college and high school biology textbook published by Prentice Hall since 1990. Miller, who is Roman Catholic, is opposed to creationism, including the intelligent design (ID) movement. He has written three books on the subject: Finding Darwin's God, Only a Theory, and The Human Instinct. Miller has received the Laetare Medal at the University of Notre Dame. In 2017, he received the inaugural St. Albert Award from the Society of Catholic Scientists.

Intelligent design movement Neo-creationist religious campaign

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<i>Darwins Black Box</i> 1996 book by Michael Behe

Darwin's Black Box: The Biochemical Challenge to Evolution is a book by Michael J. Behe, a professor of biochemistry at Lehigh University in Pennsylvania and a senior fellow of the Discovery Institute's Center for Science and Culture. In the book Behe presents his notion of irreducible complexity and argues that its presence in many biochemical systems therefore indicates that they must be the result of intelligent design rather than evolutionary processes. In 1993, Behe had written a chapter on blood clotting in Of Pandas and People, presenting essentially the same arguments but without the name "irreducible complexity," which he later presented in very similar terms in a chapter in Darwin's Black Box. Behe later agreed that he had written both and agreed to the similarities when he defended intelligent design at the Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District trial.

Wedge strategy Creationist political and social action plan

The Wedge Strategy is a creationist political and social action plan authored by the Discovery Institute, the hub of the pseudoscientific intelligent design movement. The strategy was put forth in a Discovery Institute manifesto known as the Wedge Document. Its goal is to change American culture by shaping public policy to reflect politically conservative fundamentalist evangelical Protestant values. The wedge metaphor is attributed to Phillip E. Johnson and depicts a metal wedge splitting a log.

Kansas evolution hearings 2005 Board of Education hearings in Kansas

The Kansas evolution hearings were a series of hearings held in Topeka, Kansas, United States from May 5 to 12, 2005 by the Kansas State Board of Education and its State Board Science Hearing Committee to change how evolution and the origin of life would be taught in the state's public high school science classes. The hearings were arranged by the Board of Education with the intent of introducing intelligent design into science classes via the Teach the Controversy method.

<i>Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District</i> U.S. court case about public school teaching of intelligent design creationism

Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District, 400 F. Supp. 2d 707 was the first direct challenge brought in the United States federal courts testing a public school district policy that required the teaching of intelligent design, ultimately found by the court to not be science. In October 2004, the Dover Area School District of York County, Pennsylvania, changed its biology teaching curriculum to require that intelligent design be presented as an alternative to evolution theory, and that Of Pandas and People, a textbook advocating intelligent design, was to be used as a reference book. The prominence of this textbook during the trial was such that the case is sometimes referred to as the Dover Panda Trial, a name which recalls the popular name of the Scopes Monkey Trial in Tennessee, 80 years earlier. The plaintiffs successfully argued that intelligent design is a form of creationism, and that the school board policy violated the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment to the United States Constitution. The judge's decision sparked considerable response from both supporters and critics.

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Richard Randolph "Randy" Olson is a marine biologist-turned-filmmaker who earned his Ph.D. in Biology from Harvard University (1984) and became a tenured professor of marine biology at the University of New Hampshire (1992) before changing careers by moving to Hollywood and entering film school at the University of Southern California.

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Geoffrey Simmons is a medical doctor, science fiction author and proponent of intelligent design from Eugene, Oregon. He has a BS in biology from the University of Illinois and received an M.D. from the University of Illinois Medical School in 1969. He was a doctor of internal medicine for the PeaceHealth Medical Group in Eugene, boarded in internal medicine and disaster medicine. Dr. Simmons retired at the end of 2015.

Unlocking the Mystery of Life is a 2003 intelligent design documentary film promoted and produced by Illustra Media and Focus on the Family. The film's script was written by Stephen C. Meyer, who is director of the Center for Science and Culture at the Discovery Institute, and it includes fellows of the institute such as Jonathan Wells and Michael Behe arguing for intelligent design and against evolution.

Intelligent design and science Relationship between intelligent design and science

The relationship between intelligent design and science has been a contentious one. Intelligent design (ID) is presented by its proponents as science and claims to offer an alternative to evolution. The Discovery Institute, a politically conservative think tank and the leading proponent of intelligent design, launched a campaign entitled "Teach the Controversy" which claims that a controversy exists within the scientific community over evolution. The scientific community, however, rejects intelligent design as a form of creationism. The basic facts of evolution are not a matter of controversy in science.

References

  1. ↑ "Filmmaker Portrays Evolutionists as a 'Flock of Dodos'". Live Science. 3 March 2006. Retrieved 2008-08-17.
  2. ↑ "Filmmaker Portrays Evolutionists as a 'Flock of Dodos', Ker Than, March 03, 2006 (retrieved July 24, 2013)
  3. ↑ 2006 Tribeca Film Festival (2011). "A Flock of Dodos: The Evolution-Intelligent Design Circus". Movies & TV Dept. The New York Times . Archived from the original on 2011-03-24. Retrieved 2008-08-17.
  4. ↑ "Interview: 'Flock of Dodos' and the Debate over Intelligent Design". NPR. April 26, 2006. Retrieved 2008-08-17.
  5. ↑ "Flock of Dodos: The Evolution-Intelligent Design Circus". Showtime. 2008. Archived from the original on 2008-10-18. Retrieved 2008-08-17.
  6. ↑ "Flock of Dodos". Nature. 3 February 2006. Retrieved 2008-08-17.
  7. ↑ "Nationwide Screenings of FLOCK OF DODOS to Celebrate Darwin Day 2007". National Center for Science Education. December 6, 2006. Retrieved 2009-11-06.
  8. ↑ "Randy "Flock of Dodos" Olson Speaks". Discover Magazine. February 17, 2006. Retrieved 2008-08-17.
  9. ↑ "Flock of Dodos DVD Extras, "Pulled Punches"". YouTube. May 10, 2007. Archived from the original on 2021-12-19. Retrieved 2008-08-17.
  10. 1 2 Hoax of Dodos Discovery Institute, February 7, 2007.
  11. 1 2 3 PZ Myers, Wells' false accusation against Randy Olson Archived 2007-02-12 at the Wayback Machine , Pharyngula (blog), 2007
  12. ↑ ,
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