Tag Archives: Illustra Media

Commentary

Brian Auten of Apologetics 315 provides an excellent review of Darwin’s Dilemma

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Illustra Media is the Creator of the three of the best DVDs available on intelligent design.

Their DVDs are professional documentaries with lots of great music, stunning animations and interviews with people on both sides of the question. The first DVD (watch the whole thing on youtube) is about biological information and the origin of life. The second DVD (watch the whole thing on youtube) is about fine-tuning at the galactic, stellar and planetary levels. And now there is a new DVD, that has just come out!

Here’s the trailer:

I haven’t been able to watch it yet, but Brian Auten has, and he’s written a masterful review of the DVD on his blog Apologetics 315. His review is a play-by-play account of the DVD’s content.

Excerpt:

The first quarter of the 72-minute DVD provides the historical background of the Burgess shale and describes the Cambrian Explosion as a mystery Darwin could not resolve… This introduction provides an appropriate historical explanation of how this fossil layer was discovered and explored. Computer animations bring the fossilized animals to life, showing the full body plans and complexity of the most notable animals found in the Cambrian.

[…]In the next fifteen minutes the documentary explores the development of Darwin’s theory. This describes what Darwin expected to find in the fossil record, including step-by-step transitional forms.

[…]Half way through the documentary, further Cambrian fossils are discussed: the Chinese Chengjiang fossils, which were remarkably well preserved and many of them soft-bodied.

[…]Three quarters through the documentary, young Darwin takes his voyage on the H.M.S. Beagle and the documentary describes Darwin’s evolutionary model.

[…]At the fifty-minute mark, the documentary begins to explore the structure of DNA. Just how much change in complexity is needed to create the diversity of body plans? Impressive computer animations show DNA while describing the mechanisms of mutation and natural selection.

Go here and check it the review. By the way, I have been trying to encourage Brian to listen Ron Nash’s lectures on economics and Christianity and Jennifer Roback Morse’s lectures on marriage, economics and same-sex marriage. I think he needs to broaden out his horizons a little, and apply his Christian worldview to other topics, like fiscal and social policy, etc. He likes it when people pester him about that, so feel free to leave him an encouraging comment. Or two.

By the way, I also recommend ColdWater Media‘s Icons of Evolution DVD, as well. If you’re a beginner to ID theory, and want the best book, I recommend Jonathan Wells’ “The Politically Incorrect Guide to Darwinism and Intelligent Design“. His PhD in Biology is from Berkeley, and his PhD in Religious Studies is from Yale. And yes, he debates against evolutionists, and he is very very good at it!

Wells’ debates:

  1. Michael Shermer debates Jonathan Wells at the pro-Darwinism Cato Institute (in 7 parts), MP3 audio is here.
  2. Massimo Pigliucci debates Jonathan Wells for the pro-Darwinism PBS, downloadable video and audio.

Wells even explains the Cambrian explosion here, if you’ve never heard of it before.

One last thing. I e-mailed Illustra to ask them when the professionally-produced Craig-Hitchens debate DVD would go on sale, and they replied and told me that it would be ready by January 2010.

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Polemics

Is opposition to evolution based on ignorance of the scientific data?

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Consider this article by Jonathan Wells.

First, let’s re-cap the challenge to evolution from the phenomenon of the Cambrian explosion.

The newly released film “Darwin’s Dilemma” argues that the geologically abrupt appearance of the major groups of animals (the “phyla”) in the Cambrian Explosion posed a serious problem for Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution (as he himself knew), and that subsequent fossil discoveries—far from solving the problem—have made it worse.

Basically, all the major body plans we have today appear in the fossil record in a 2-3 million period about 543 million years ago. There are no precursors in the fossil record showing the gradual evolution of these major body plans.

The Cambrian Explosion: 0 to 60 in a few million years
The Cambrian Explosion: 0 to 60 in a few million years

Darwin expected to discover lots and lots of fossils leading up to the Cambrian explosion period that would show how all these phyla came into existence slowly over time. Unfortunately for the naturalistic evolutionists, the discoveries we’ve been making haven’t shown any hint of precursor fossils leading up the Cambrian explosion.

Since 1859, however, many Precambrian fossils have been found, including microfossils of single-celled bacteria in rocks more than three billion years old. In addition, multicellular Precambrian fossils have been found in the Ediacara Hills of Australia, though there is continuing debate over whether any—or how many—of the Ediacaran fossils were animals, or what relationship—if any—they had to the Cambrian phyla. In 1998, Cambridge University paleobiologist Simon Conway Morris (who is featured in the film “Darwin’s Dilemma”) wrote, “Apart from the few Ediacaran survivors… there seems to be a sharp demarcation between the strange world of Ediacaran life and the relatively familiar Cambrian fossils” (Crucible of Creation, 30).

But wait! Maybe we can’t find the precusor fossils required by Darwinism because they are too small or too soft to have survived for so long?

Since 1859, however, many Precambrian fossils have been found, including microfossils of single-celled bacteria in rocks more than three billion years old. In addition, multicellular Precambrian fossils have been found in the Ediacara Hills of Australia… In 1998, Cambridge University paleobiologist Simon Conway Morris… wrote, “Apart from the few Ediacaran survivors… there seems to be a sharp demarcation between the strange world of Ediacaran life and the relatively familiar Cambrian fossils” (Crucible of Creation, 30).

So there is now no shortage of Precambrian fossils. Not only do we have fossils of bacteria, but we also have many fossils of soft-bodied Multicellular organisms. “In the Ediacaran organisms there is no evidence for any skeletal hard parts,” wrote Conway Morris in 1998. “Ediacaran fossils look as if they were effectively soft-bodied” (Crucible of Creation, 28). The same is true of many of the organisms fossilized in the Cambrian explosion.

But wait! Scientists have discovered lots of exceptionally preserved microbes just before the Cambrian explosion. Don’t microbes count as precursors to the Cambrian explosion phyla?

Richard Callow and Martin Brasier reported in the January 2009 issue of the Journal of the Geological Society, London “a variety of exceptionally preserved microbes” from late Precambrian rocks in England that address “the paradox known as ‘“Darwin’s dilemma’.”

[…]Callow and Brasier didn’t solve Darwin’s dilemma. Instead, they put one more nail in the coffin of Darwin’s attempt to salvage his theory from it. The truth is that “exceptionally preserved microbes” from the late Precambrian actually deepen Darwin’s dilemma, because they suggest that if there had been ancestors to the Cambrian phyla they would have been preserved.

I am willing to believe in evolution. But in order to get me to believe it, I insist on seeing a fossil record that shows the gradual emergence of phyla, one or two at a time, over hundreds of millions of years. That is what Darwinism predicts. We now have a solid record of what came before the Cambrian explosion. So where are the precursors? Where is the record of gradual emergence? Where is my evidence?

More on the Cambrian explosion

The origin of life and biological information

Videos on intelligent design

News

New Illustra Media DVD on the Cambrian Explosion available to pre-order

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ARN reports on “Darwin’s Dilemma”, the final DVD in the magnificent intelligent design trilogy.

Excerpt:

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.

I would click through to ARN’s description if you’re interested, they have a feature list! They also link to the trailer, which you can view online.

Paul Chien and Simon Conway Morris are the top two paleontologists on Cambrian era fossils in the world, in my opinion. (One is an expert on the Burgess Shale in Canada, the other on the Chengjiang Valley in China – the two best locations in the world for Cambrian era fossils). James Valentine is also an expert on the Cambrian era fossils. This will be a HOOT!

Related DVDs

The first two DVDs “Unlocking the Mystery of Life” and “The Privileged Planet” are must-buys, but you can watch them on youtube if you want, for free.

Here are the 2 playlists:

I also recommend Coldwater Media’s “Icons of Evolution”. All three of these are on sale from Amazon.com.

Previous posts

I have to tell you a joke. I just bought an Expelled DVD for one of the guys in my office. But a different guy in my office watched it all by himself on the weekend, the same weekend I went to his church, which he has always been trying to get me to do. Well I offered to take the second guy out to lunch so we could talk about it, but he wants me to rake his lawn for him! He has a HUGE lawn in the country!

The things I do to make people learn things so God will have a stronger bench!