Orac is the nom de blog of a (not so) humble pseudonymous surgeon/scientist with an ego just big enough to delude himself that someone, somewhere might actually give a rodent's posterior about his miscellaneous verbal meanderings, but just barely small enough to admit to himself that few will. (Continued 
Today's the day, everyone.
I haven't mentioned this before, but the documentary on the trial over the teaching of "intelligent design" creationism in the classroom in Dover, Pennsylvania two years ago is set to premiere on your local PBS station tonight at 8 PM. The Nova documentary, Judgment Day: Intelligent Design on Trial, already has the Discovery Institute up in arms because from all reports thus far (and indeed from the content of the documentary website, which presents fossil evidence and a detailed discussion of evolution) it is uncompromising in its viewpoint that ID is not science.
Good. What we need is less false "balance," where any viewpoint, no matter how unsupported by science, is given an airing as "the other side." Now if we could only get Richard Dawkin's evaluation of "alternative" medicine or an American equivalent aired on PBS.
Life Science
Comments
As you've rightly pointed out, the idea that letting crackpots like the IDers and the altmedders air their crank theories in the interest of "providing balance" is about as "fair and balanced" as Fox News. I really think that the best way to summarize the issue is
this comic.
Posted by: N.B. | November 13, 2007 2:58 PM
And via one of the national news reports, I hear the video is (going to be) available online too. Likely linked to by Pharyngula.
Posted by: Patrick | November 13, 2007 7:18 PM
That was an excellent documentary! I particularly loved the interview with the one overweight school board member who asked but didn't ask his congregation for money for the textbooks.
You can't be fair and balanced when it comes to creationism because you can't balance something that doesn't have any weight.
Posted by: ozzy | November 13, 2007 10:27 PM
Watched it. Taped it. Masterful job. I loved the bit about the mousetrap tie-clip.
Posted by: wolfwalker | November 14, 2007 12:12 AM
It was great but I wish the witnesses who committed perjury had been charged with it. I'd also like to know the judge's response when one of them claimed he had "misspoken."
Its too bad that so many christians think that evolution is anti-god. I agree that it makes it impossible to accept the Genesis stories as literal truth, but in college those stories were presented as just another culture's creation myth. The catholics and episcopalians seem to grasp this but many southern baptists don't. This is probably due in part to the fact that southern baptists tend to have the lowest education level of any of the religions so they haven't been exposed to history and myths.
Posted by: Texas Reader | November 14, 2007 12:15 PM