In the News

Seeking God in Science: An Atheist Defends Intelligent Design by Bradley Monton is a breakthrough book in the origins debate. Why? Because an atheist professor of philosophy at a secular university has written a book to defend intelligent design. As Monton would admit, it's a partial defense, as he does not find ID arguments overwhelmingly convincing, but he also does not find them trivial, and he believes they should be allowed on the table and in the classroom for discussion. He even went so far as to defend ID in a public debate in 2008, and his position as a true educator seeking truth has brought the wrath of Darwinists and fellow atheists down on his head. Welcome to the club Dr. Monton!

His work on a rigorous definition of intelligent design in chapter 1 is worth the price of the book alone. While most ID proponents use sound byte definitions to communicate the essence of ID to the public, Monton develops a rigorous definition that he feels will help in testing ID theory. We wouldn't expect any less of a philosophy of science professor and we think his definition will generate a more meaningful dialogue. But don't worry, you don't have to be a philosopher to understand this book. Monton has done a great job of making his arguments accessible to the general reader. This book is now available at ARN.

Stephen Meyer, Michael Behe, David Berlinski and John West are all featured speakers at The Legacy of Darwin Intelligent Design Conference to be held at the Douglas County Event Center in Castle Rock Colorado this weekend October 30-31. The Conference fee is $10. For more information visit www.shepherdproject.com/idconf/notabene.html or call 1-800-253-1869. Registrations will also be taken at the door. The conference begins 7 pm Friday night.

Yesterday an interview between John McWhorter and Michael Behe about Behe's recent book The Edge of Evolution appeared on bloggingheads.tv. Within hours the interview disappeared with this message "from" McWhorter posted by the administator: "John McWhorter feels, with regret, that this interview represents neither himself, Professor Behe, nor Bloggingheads usefully, takes full responsibility for same, and has asked that it be taken down from the site. He apologizes to all who found its airing objectionable."

Fortunately someone archived the interview and it has reappeared in several places on the internet. Take a look for yourself and see if you think this interview represents McWhorter, Behe or Bloggingheads, especially given Bloggingheads' claim of being an open forum below. Just another example of the "Expelled Factor" at work.

Michael Behe reports on the incident himself here.

UPDATE 8-31-09: It appears cooler heads have prevailed at Bloggingheads and the Behe interview has been reposted with an explanation.

From the Bloggingheads web site:

"Bloggingheads is in some ways a classic expression of the Internet: the ever-dropping cost of information-processing allows people to interact in new ways, and a whole new tribe-the Bloggingheads tribe-is formed. But we hope to be in one sense an unusual expression of the Internet. Almost all blogs have a dominant ideology and a fairly homogeneous comments section to match. We pride ourselves on having a diversity of views in our diavlogs and an accordingly diverse comments section, where thoughtful disagreement is expressed in civil terms. (OK, usually thoughtful, and usually civil.) We thank our commenters-and for that matter our less-vocal viewers, and of course all the bloggingheads-for making this website a place where great minds don't think alike."

Animation Gives Unique Look Inside the Cell

A new short animated video, Journey Inside The Cell, launched this week which dramatically illustrates the evidence for intelligent design within DNA, as described in Stephen C. Meyer's book, Signature in the Cell: DNA and the Evidence for Intelligent Design (HarperOne 2009).

The original animation by Light Productions reveals in intricate detail how the digital information in DNA directs protein synthesis inside the cell, revealing a world of molecular machines and nano-processors communicating digital information.

"This video is going to make things worse for critics of intelligent design," Dr. Meyer explains. "They will have more difficulty convincing the public that their eyes are deceiving them when the evidence for design literally unfolds before them in this animation."

Narrated by Stephen Meyer, the video is a brief tour of the molecular labyrinth, the cell's sophisticated information-processing system, which not only produces machines, but also reproduces itself. The three minute animated video is available for viewing online in the ARN Molecular Machine Museum. For public use copyright permissions, contact cscinfo@discovery.org.

The final film in Illustra Media's long-planned Intelligent Design trilogy, Darwin's Dilemma, is scheduled for release September 15, 2009 and is currently available for pre-order at ARN at a special introductory price.

This documentary will examine what many consider to be the most powerful refutation of Darwinian evolution-the Cambrian fossil evidence. Charles Darwin realized that the fossil evidence did not support his theory of gradual, step-by-step evolutionary development. He hoped that future generations of scientists would make the discoveries necessary to validate his ideas. Today, after more than 150 years of exploration fossil evidence of slow, incremental biological change has yet to be excavated. Instead, we find a picture of the rapid appearance of fully developed, complex organisms during the outset of the Cambrian geological era. Organisms that embody almost all of the major animal body plans that exist today. This remarkable explosion of life is best explained by the existence of a transcendent intelligence.

Filmed on four continents, this fascinating documentary examines some of the most important fossil discoveries ever made... and, with them, a mystery deeper than Darwin ever imagined. The Cambrian explosion was actually an explosion of biological information: assembly instructions in DNA and embryonic blueprints that directed the development of the first complex animals...information that points unmistakably to foresight, purpose and intelligent design.

Darwin's Dilemma is a high-quality documentary that includes interviews with world-class paleontologists Simon Conway Morris and James Valentine, as well as leading intelligent design theorists and scientists Paul Nelson, Jonathan Wells, Stephen C. Meyer, Paul Chien, Doug Axe, and Richard Sternberg.

Several messages come through loud and clear in the documentary:

1. Paleontologists freely admit the Cambrian Explosion evidence presents a problem for Darwin's theory

2. The fantastic animations communicate visually the complexity of the Cambrian creatures

3. The complexity graphs shown make it abundantly clear that Darwin's predictions do not match the evidence and in fact the evidence is almost the complete opposite

4. The relative time frame of the biological big bang (2 minutes late in the 24 hour clock of earth history) make it virtually impossible for random mutations and natural selection to produce the complexity and information content found in the Cambrian in such a late and short time frame

5. Even Chinese scientists are turning against Darwin's theory based on the Cambrian Explosion evidence found in their own country (which is some of the best)

As with the first two Illustra Media ID documentaries, Unlocking the Mystery of Life and The Privileged Planet, Darwin's Dilemma is full of high quality animations to help the viewer visualize the amazing complexity and design of the Cambrian creatures. You can watch a trailer for Darwin's Dilemma is here.

On June 2, 2009 as Congress debated global warming legislation that would raise energy costs to consumers by hundreds of billions of dollars, the Nongovernmental International Panel on Climate Change (NIPCC) released an 880-page book challenging the scientific basis of concerns that global warming is either man-made or would have harmful effects. In "Climate Change Reconsidered: The 2009 Report of the Nongovernmental International Panel on Climate Change (NIPCC)," coauthors Dr. S. Fred Singer and Dr. Craig Idso and 35 contributors and reviewers present an authoritative and detailed rebuttal of the findings of the United Nations' Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). The scholarship in this book demonstrates overwhelming scientific support for the position that the warming of the twentieth century was moderate and not unprecedented, that its impact on human health and wildlife was positive, and that carbon dioxide probably is not the driving factor behind climate change. The full 880 page report, Climate Change Reconsidered, can be downloaded for free, along with a 48 page downloadable summary, Nature, Not Human Acivity, Rules the Climate, which is the recommended place to start for those who want a quick overview or the evidence and arguments.

Links to these reports have been added to the ARN resource page on global warming, which provides viewpoints from both the Alarmists and the Skeptics, a great place to start for those trying to sort out the facts.

Kevin Wirth, ARN Director of Product Development, will be interviewing Dr. Phillip Johnson Saturday May 30th at 5 PM E.T. on Station WTBN 570 AM
Tampa Bay, Florida. You can listen in at www.bayword.com by clicking on the "Listen Live" link at the top of the page. Johnson will discuss challenges facing the ID movement and an upcomming book on the New Atheists he is co-authoring with Biola Professor John Mark Reynolds.

Rumors are that this may be the last media interview given by Dr. Johnson. To celebrate the occasion we are offering our web visitors two Phil Johnson specials for a limited time. You can grab a hardback copy of his classic Wedge of Truth book for 45% off and the ARN collection of The Best of Phil Johnson DVDs which includes ten lectures, interviews and debates for 50% off.

ARN Economic Stimulus Plan: 10% Off Everything until April 30! We are not going to leave it up to President Obama, Congress, or GM to get our economy going again. We are putting our money on you! Literally. To help you get out your wallet and start spending to bring our economy back we are offering our ARN friends 10% off everything in our store. Hurry though, the sales ends April 30th. Check out our books, videos and Real Science 4 Kids Curriculum. Enter the code "APR09" in the Coupon field when you check out and the 10% discount will be applied to everything in your shopping cart.

These discount coupons are sent out periodically to those on our ARN Announce email list. If you would like to be notified about our sales, as well as new resources posted to our web site, be sure to sign up for ARN Announce. Some of our closeout sales are up to 50% off and only our email members are notified about these specials.

The final film in Illustra Media's long-planned Intelligent Design trilogy, Darwin's Dilemma, is scheduled for release this summer and will be available for purchase at ARN.

This documentary will examine what many consider to be the most powerful refutation of Darwinian evolution-the Cambrian fossil record. Charles Darwin realized that the fossil evidence did not support his theory of gradual, step-by-step evolutionary development. He hoped that future generations of scientists would make the discoveries necessary to validate his ideas. Today, after more than 150 years of exploration fossil evidence of slow, incremental biological change has yet to be excavated. Instead, we find a picture of the rapid appearance of fully developed, complex organisms during the outset of the Cambrian geological era. Organisms that embody almost all of the major animal body plans that exist today. This remarkable explosion of life is best explained by the existence of a transcendent intelligence.

As with the first two Illustra Media ID documentaries, Unlocking the Mystery of Life and The Privileged Planet, Darwin's Dilemma is full of high quality animations to help the viewer visualize the amazing complexity and design of the Cambrian creatures. You can watch a trailer for Darwin's Dilemma is here.

March Madness Sale!! The Darwin Bicentennial Celebration and the NCAA March Madness Tournament have us worked up into a frenzy. Now until the end of this month you can order Phillip Johnson's classic lecture "The Blind Watchmaker: A Skeptical Look at Darwinism" on DVD for only $15 including US shipping ($25 Foreign). That's a 40% discount off the retail price. Professor Johnson delivers this indictment on Darwin's theory at the University of Wales. This is a great time to add this memorable lecture to your personal collection and share it with family and friends during the 2009 Darwin Celebrations. Hurry though, the sales ends March 31. Order today.