Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed Page #10

The spirit of the movement

lives on today.

Weikart:
margaret sanger

Was the head

of planned parenthood.

She was very fanatical

in her promotion of eugenics.

In fact, planned parenthood

was all about birth control

For the impoverished

and lower classes

To try to help improve

the species.

From hadamar,

I traveled

with dr. Weikart to dachau,

Where the nazis applied

the ideas of eugenics

On a massive

mechanistic scale.

When it was

a fully functioning

concentration camp,

Uh, what was

the purpose of it?

I mean, part of it

was to repress

political enemies.

What was the rest

of the purpose?

Well, beyond the repression

of the political enemies,

Which was its purpose

at the very beginning,

Then later on it transformed

into repressing racial enemies.

And sometimes

those categories overlapped

Because sometimes

they thought

That these people

were political enemies

Because they were

inferior biologically.

The war itself

was part of

The darwinian struggle

for existence, for hitler.

And he saw that

extermination of the jews

As one of those fronts

to this warfare going on,

As this darwinian struggle

for existence.

Would you say

that hitler was insane?

No, I wouldn't say

he was insane.

I think he had imbibed

some very, very wrong ideas,

And, in fact, I think

He took the logic of them

in certain ways

That brought

him to take

Very radical solutions

for them.

Would you say

he was evil?

Oh, i'd definitely say

he was evil.

Is there such

a thing as evil?

Oh, I think there is.

And is there such

a thing as good?

Oh, definitely.

And...Evil can sometimes

be rationalized as science.

Oh, sure.

And evil can sometimes

be rationalized--

When it's rationalized

as science,

And I think

when it was rationalized

in this particular way,

I think hitler thought

he was doing good.

He thought

he was doing good?

Oh, I think so.

He thought he was

benefiting humanity

By driving evolution

forward

And creating

a better humanity.

Before leaving dachau,

I stopped by the memorial

Commemorating

the thousands of jews

Who were killed there

in excruciating conditions.

I know that darwinism

Does not automatically

equate to nazism.

But if darwinism

inspired and justified

Such horrific events

in the past,

Could it be used

to rationalize

Similar initiatives today?

There's a good

german expression,

"so faengt es immer an."

I mean, "always begins

in the same way,"

Something to remember

in the context of

The united states' discussions

of euthanasia and abortion.

It always begins

in the same way.

There seems to be

an excellent argument

For getting rid

of useless people

by killing them.

Or at least

it seems excellent

To the people

advancing the argument.

It's the love affair

with death

And, you know, the euthanasia

and this movement going on,

Which I find appalling.

And the idea is that,

you know,

Immediately rid our society

Of anybody

who might be a drain

And think of people

in economic terms,

And I think that's

where some of the darwin

fits in, actually.

It's just a devaluing

of human life.

First of all,

if you take seriously

That evolution

has to do with

The transition

of life forms

And that life and death

are just natural processes,

Then one gets to be liberal

about abortion and euthanasia.

All of those kinds of ideas,

Seem to me, follow

very naturally

From a darwinian

perspective,

A de-privileging

of human beings,

basically.

And I think that people

who want to endorse darwinism

Have to sort of take

this kind of viewpoint

very seriously.

And when we see an elite--

and it is an elite--

An elite that

controls essentially

All the research money

in science,

Saying, "there is no

such thing as moral truth;

Science will not be

related to religion."

I mean, it's essentially

official policy

Of the national academy

of science

That religion and science

will not be related.

I mean, hey, that cuts off

a lot of debate, doesn't it?

What's going to happen

if this doesn't change?

I think we're watching

it happen, aren't we?

I needed time to think,

So I traveled

to the birthplace

of this idea.

"with savages,

the weak in body or mind

"are soon eliminated.

"we civilized men,

on the other hand,

"do our utmost to check

the process of elimination.

"we build asylums

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."

--charles darwin,

the descent of man, 1871.

[church bells tolling]

Meyer:
throughout

the cold war in germany,

There was this wall erected

to keep ideas out.

It was erected by people

who held an ideology,

That were afraid

of a competition

From other ideas

that would come

into their society.

And what we're seeing

happening in science today

Is very much like that.

But I think that's

just a strategy

For protecting

a failing ideology

from competition.

America didn't become

the great nation that it is

By suppressing ideas.

It progressed

by allowing freedom of speech

And freedom of inquiry.

Thomas jefferson

got it right when he wrote,

"we hold these truths

to be self-evident,

"that all men

are created equal,

"that they are endowed

by their creator

"with certain

unalienable rights,

"that among these

are life, liberty,

And the pursuit

of happiness."

Hundreds of thousands

of americans

Have given their lives

to protect these values,

But now they're

under threat once again.

It wasn't just scientists

who were being expelled.

It was freedom itself,

The very foundation

of the american dream,

The very foundation

of america.

If we allowed freedom

to be expelled in science,

Where would it end?

The darwinian establishment

Is so massive

and so entrenched

It appears impenetrable.

I couldn't bring it down

myself,

But I could at least confront

Those who'd expelled

the scientists i'd met.

What would you say

if you had eugenie scott

sitting next to you?

What would you say to her?

I would ask her

by what authority

Does she

and those like her

Presume to declare

What is

and is not science.

He's sort of made himself

martyr of the day.

They've gotten a lot

of mileage out of,

You know,

poor rick sternberg.

And we got lip service

From the leadership

of the smithsonian,

But I didn't feel they

ever followed through.

We went into the smithsonian

looking for answers,

But we ran

into the same stone wall

as congressman souder.

You're not authorized

to do this here, so stop.

[overlapping chatter]

He said, "nonetheless,

you have to be disciplined,"

And I lost my job.

We did get an interview

With a spokesman

from george mason,

But it was impossible

to knock him off his script.

Her contract

Rate this script:0.0 / 0 votes