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This is Scientific American's 60-Second Science. Hi, Steve Mirsky. Here, I'm going over our usual one minute today.
By now you've probably heard of "Expelled", the new Ben Stein anti-evolution crocumentary. It officially opens today, as I speak that's April 18th. Because of my job, I've had the misfortune of sitting through this film twice now, at least I was getting paid. The film tries very hard to connect Darwin with the Holocaust1. Toward the end Stein reads the following quote from the book Descent of Man "with savages2, the weak in body or mind, are soon eliminated, we civilized3 man, on the other hand, do our utmost to check the process of elimination4. We build asylums5 for the imbecile, the maimed and the sick, thus the weak members of civilized societies propagate their kind. No one who has attended to the breeding of domestic animals will doubt that this must be highly injurious to the race of man. Hardly anyone is so ignorant as to allow his worst animals to breed.” That's the end of the quote, and when he finishes reading the quote, Ben Stein intones the guilty verdict by naming the source--Charles Darwin.
Oh my! It sounds like Darwin actually did provide a rationale to the horrific practices of the Nazis6. Well, I've been covering the anti-evolution crowd for over twenty years. So I immediately suspected that the propaganda makers7 had engaged in what's called "quote mining". You examine the writings of somebody you want to smear8, and then selectively quote those portions that appear to make your point. I bet that whatever came immediately after the quoted portion would be something that Ben Stein wouldn't want you to hear. My research took all of about 3 minutes. I went to a full text of "Descent of Man" online and found the quoted passage, and then found the sentences that come right after where Ben Stein stopped quoting.
So here is Charles Darwin again from "Decent of Man": "The aid which we feel impelled9 to give to the helpless is mainly an incidental result of the instinct of sympathy which was originally acquired as part of the social instincts, but subsequently rendered in the manner previously10 indicated more tender and more widely diffused11. Nor could we check our sympathy, even at the urging of hard reason, without deterioration12 in the noblest heart of our nature. The surgeon may harden himself whilst performing an operation, for he knows that he is acting13 for the good of his patient. But if we were intentionally14 to neglect the weak and helpless, it could only be for a contingent15 benefit within overwhelming present evil--leads to kind of the very opposite impression of Darwin that the film makers want you to take away.
Mind you none of this has anything to do with whether or not Darwin's scientific findings were correct, they were, but Ben Stein and his cronies, in their selective use of passages written by a great man, merely showed themselves to be so very small. We have a package of coverage16 about "Expelled", and its misinformation at our website Sciam.com. Also check out a resource page put together by the National Center for Science Education
For Scientific American's 60-Second Science, I'm Steve Mirsky.
1 holocaust | |
n.大破坏;大屠杀 | |
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2 savages | |
未开化的人,野蛮人( savage的名词复数 ) | |
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3 civilized | |
a.有教养的,文雅的 | |
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4 elimination | |
n.排除,消除,消灭 | |
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5 asylums | |
n.避难所( asylum的名词复数 );庇护;政治避难;精神病院 | |
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6 Nazis | |
n.(德国的)纳粹党员( Nazi的名词复数 );纳粹主义 | |
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7 makers | |
n.制造者,制造商(maker的复数形式) | |
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8 smear | |
v.涂抹;诽谤,玷污;n.污点;诽谤,污蔑 | |
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9 impelled | |
v.推动、推进或敦促某人做某事( impel的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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10 previously | |
adv.以前,先前(地) | |
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11 diffused | |
散布的,普及的,扩散的 | |
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12 deterioration | |
n.退化;恶化;变坏 | |
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13 acting | |
n.演戏,行为,假装;adj.代理的,临时的,演出用的 | |
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14 intentionally | |
ad.故意地,有意地 | |
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15 contingent | |
adj.视条件而定的;n.一组,代表团,分遣队 | |
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16 coverage | |
n.报导,保险范围,保险额,范围,覆盖 | |
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