September 14, 2005--"March of the Guppies"
I sense that you may be feeling, “Enough already about Bush and Condi and race and income disparity.” I hear you. How about a break; how about a word about them penguins?
Have you seen The March of the Penguins? If you haven’t, the Conservatives have been poring into movie theaters in numbers not seen since The Passion of The Christ (it is their Fahrenheit 9/11). Why you may be asking am I spoiling your pleasure by turning this charming documentary into something political? Don’t blame me; blame Michael Medved (conservative film critic and radio talk show host) and the National Review, among others.
As reported in the NY Times Science Section (see link below), many on the Right are seeing evidence of Intelligent Design (ID) in the life of penguins: In Medved’s words, this film “most passionately affirms traditional norms like monogamy, sacrifice, and child rearing.” To the Reverend Ben Hunter, who is coordinating trips to the local Sidney, Ohio movie theater for his parishioners, “Some of the circumstances [the penguins] experienced seemed to parallel those of Christians. The penguin is falling behind, is like some Christians falling behind. The path changes every year, yet they find their way. [It’s] like the Holy Spirit.”
I have nothing against penguins or the Holy Spirit; in fact I love penguins. I can’t get enough of them; but please, from the full Animal Kingdom, to selectively cite them as the best case in support of ID is a little pseudo.
For example, what if we were to look at the behavior of, say, Guppies? What if we were to check on their mating habits and how they care for their young? Would we find similar evidence of ID? Would we find monogamy, sacrifice, and child rearing? Let’s do a little Goggling.
Checking the definitive Guppy Website, GuppyPlace.com, we find a world that is very different from that of penguins. Among other things, Guppies are everything but monogamous and, are you sitting down, the“females are cannibalistic”—they eat their babies (fry). And thus Guppy breeders have to provide “many hiding places for the fry” so the species can survive.
Sounds more like Evolution to me.
Tomorrow, back to Iraq.
Have you seen The March of the Penguins? If you haven’t, the Conservatives have been poring into movie theaters in numbers not seen since The Passion of The Christ (it is their Fahrenheit 9/11). Why you may be asking am I spoiling your pleasure by turning this charming documentary into something political? Don’t blame me; blame Michael Medved (conservative film critic and radio talk show host) and the National Review, among others.
As reported in the NY Times Science Section (see link below), many on the Right are seeing evidence of Intelligent Design (ID) in the life of penguins: In Medved’s words, this film “most passionately affirms traditional norms like monogamy, sacrifice, and child rearing.” To the Reverend Ben Hunter, who is coordinating trips to the local Sidney, Ohio movie theater for his parishioners, “Some of the circumstances [the penguins] experienced seemed to parallel those of Christians. The penguin is falling behind, is like some Christians falling behind. The path changes every year, yet they find their way. [It’s] like the Holy Spirit.”
I have nothing against penguins or the Holy Spirit; in fact I love penguins. I can’t get enough of them; but please, from the full Animal Kingdom, to selectively cite them as the best case in support of ID is a little pseudo.
For example, what if we were to look at the behavior of, say, Guppies? What if we were to check on their mating habits and how they care for their young? Would we find similar evidence of ID? Would we find monogamy, sacrifice, and child rearing? Let’s do a little Goggling.
Checking the definitive Guppy Website, GuppyPlace.com, we find a world that is very different from that of penguins. Among other things, Guppies are everything but monogamous and, are you sitting down, the“females are cannibalistic”—they eat their babies (fry). And thus Guppy breeders have to provide “many hiding places for the fry” so the species can survive.
Sounds more like Evolution to me.
Tomorrow, back to Iraq.
posted by Steven Zwerling at
10:31 AM
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