Flock of Dodos
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| Flock of Dodos | |
|---|---|
| Directed by | Randy Olson |
| Written by | Randy Olson |
| Distributed by | Documentary Educational Resources |
| Running time | 84 minutes |
| Country | USA |
| Language | English |
| Official website | |
| Allmovie profile | |
| IMDb profile | |
Flock of Dodos 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 consensus that supports evolution.
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 the SUNY Stony Brook, marking the celebration of Charles Darwin's birthday.
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[edit] Synopsis
Flock of Dodos examines the disagreements that proponents of intelligent design have with the scientific consensus position of evolution. The evolutionarily famous dodo (Raphus cucullatus) is a now-extinct bird that lived on the Island of Mauritius, which is approximately 500 miles east of Madagascar. When Portuguese sailors arrived on the island, the possible combination of over-hunting and introduction of new predators (i.e. pigs, macaques) seems to have led to its extinction by approximately 1700. 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. It failed to change with an evolving environment, which ultimately led to the birds' demise.
The film attempts to determine who the real "dodos" are in a constantly evolving world: the scientists who are failing to promote evolution as a scientifically accepted fact, the intelligent design advocates, or the American public who get fooled by the "salesmanship" of the Discovery Institute. While Randy Olson ultimately sides with the scientists who accept evolution, he gives equal air time to both sides of the argument, including intelligent design proponent Michael Behe and several of his colleagues.
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 Mike Behe, John Calvart (founder of the ARN Network) and a member of the Kansas school board. Olson also unsuccessfully tries to interview Kansas school board member Connie Morris and members of the Discovery Institute.
[edit] Release
The documentary premiered at the Tribeca Film Festival in New York, in April 2006, 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 TV in the US and available on DVD.
[edit] Response
The Discovery Institute, a hub of the intelligent design movement, responded to the documentary by mounting a campaign, Hoax of Dodos,[1] characterizing the documentary as "revisionist history," and a "hoax" filled with inaccuracies and misrepresentations.[2]
To the statement in the documentary that Ernst Haeckel's exaggerated drawings of embryos 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"[3] and that the latest instance of textbooks supporting Haeckel's drawings Olson could find was in a 1915 textbook, supporters of intelligent design have since claimed reproductions of Haeckel's drawings persist in contemporary biology textbooks.[2] In response, PZ 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. PZ 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."[3]
In early 2007 the Discovery Institute claimed a factual error in the documentary exists regarding the institute. In the film Olson claims "The Discovery Institute is truly the big fish in this picture, with an annual budget of around 5 million dollars." The Discovery Institute has responded that their budget is only 4.2 million, they spend close to 1 million per year funding intelligent design, and the yearly budget for the whole Discovery Institute has never even reached 5 million.[1] The Discovery Institute's tax filings for 2003 and 2004 show the budget for the institute reached $4,233,814 in revenue in 2003 and $3,539,228 in expenditures in 2004.[1][2] Most of the money was said by the Discovery Institute to have been spent on research in transportation, technology, and other topics.[4]
[edit] References
- ^ a b Hoax of Dodos Discovery Institute staff, February 7, 2007.
- ^ a b Hoax of Dodos Discovery Institute.
- ^ a b PZ Myers: Wells' false accusation against Randy Olson. http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2007/02/wells_false_accusation_against.php
- ^ Evolution News & Views: Hoax of Dodos, pt. 2: Flock of Dodos Filmmaker Uses Fuzzy Math and Falsehoods to Distort the Truth about Discovery Institute
[edit] External links
- Flock of Dodos
- Hoax of Dodos (Criticism of "Flock of Dodos")
- LiveScience.com article
- Science Friday Commentary (Feb. 23. 07)
- Profile of "Flock of Dodos" director Randy Olson by Eric Sorensen in (2007) Forward thinkers: People to watch in 2007. Conservation, 8(1).
- PZ Myers responding to the criticisms about Haeckel's drawings
