So right after Ben Stein starts up a new holiday, maybe he can send a few fruit baskets with “sorry I used you as a prop for the purposes of promoting intelligent design” notes. Among the “cast of thousands” in Stein’s Expelled are Richard Dawkins and A-list science blogger PZ Myers. Well, both Dawkins and Myers are saying that they were tricked into appearing. “At no time was I given the slightest clue that these people were a creationist front,” said Dawkins to the Guardian. And Myers said he was led to believe the film was called Crossroads: The Intersection of Science and Religion. Stein and the film’s producers told the NYT that they didn’t mislead anyone. (That same piece includes one of the producers saying that Francis Collins only separates his faith and scientific work because he’s toeing the scientific “party line,” which Collins says is “just ludicrous.”)
-Greg Dahlmann