I got a letter from the producers of this new evolution series to be shown on 17 June on The History Channel. It allays many of the concerns we had from the original press release.

I want to thank you for your post “The History Channel might do something right” (May 6) about the channel’s upcoming series on evolution. Unfortunately the synopsis that was posted was actually a draft of an intended press release (written by a PR copywriter as one of your readers correctly suggested) which was sent out in error before it had been vetted for accuracy.

As one of the producers working on evolve, I just wanted to allay the fears of some commenters on your site who understandably interpreted the synopsis’s inaccuracies as cause for concern about the factuality of the series. A corrected version of this release is being issued by History Channel and procedures have been put in place to prevent this type of mistake in the future.

Please be assured that the producers have taken extraordinary pains to ensure the integrity of the series. We are working with the top accredited evolutionary biologists in their field, too numerous to name here. And all of our scripts are being vetted by Carl Zimmer, a science journalist whose books and articles on evolution you likely know.

We know your readers likely know a lot more about this topic than a general TV audience. But we’re doing our very best to keep both the laypeople who don’t have that knowledge and the ardent devotees tuning in week after week. Regardless, I think we can all agree that the series represents a terrific opportunity to educate the mass public on matters of evolution.

I’m willing to give it a chance. Let’s tune in and see if they thrill us!

I just got this announcement for a new series to appear on the History Channel in June. This has the potential to be really good — at least it sounds like the focus is on the biology — and we’ll have to tune in.

SERIES PREMIERE!
EVOLVE:
EYES

Eyes are one of evolution’s most useful and prevalent inventions, equipping approximately 95 percent of living species. They exist in many different forms across nature, having evolved convergently across different species. Learn how the ancestors of jellyfish may have been the first to evolve light-sensitive cells. In the pre-Cambrian era, insects, in particular the dragonfly, would take the compound eye to new heights. Find out how dinosaurs adapted their eyes to become such successful hunters of prey. And while dinosaurs remained at the top of the food chain for 150 million years, tiny early mammals developed night vision to populate the night as a survival technique. Finally, learn how primates underwent several adaptations to their eyes to better exploit their new habitat, and how the ability to see colors helped them find food.

Throughout eons of evolution, the natural world has played host to a never-ending competition. Since the dawn of time roughly 99% of all species have become extinct. In order to survive, all creatures, including man, must treat life as a battlefield and master the natural weapons and defenses that have evolved: Tyrannosaurus Rex’s 13-inch canines; the gecko’s Velcro-like toe pads; the bald eagle’s telescopic vision that is capable of spotting a hare a mile away. What is the history of these evolutions and how did they come about? They didn’t just appear arbitrarily, they evolved for a common reason – to give these animals a critical edge in interspecies warfare. To evolve is to conquer!

The new series EVOLVE traces the history of the key innovations that have driven nature’s evolutionary arms race from the dawn of life to today, from the anatomical (eyes, jaws, and body armor) to the behavioral (movement, communication, and sex). This 13-part series will deftly blend spectacular live-action natural history sequences, CGI, epic docudrama, and experimental science to illustrate our and our fellow species’ eternal struggle for survival on earth.

PREMIERE: Tuesday, June 17 at 10pm/2am ET/PT
LENGTH: 2 hours
REPEATS: Sunday, June 22 at 11pm/3am ET/PT
PRODUCED BY: Optomen Productions, Inc.

And he is dismayed at the absence of science. Charles Darwin’s blog reviews a week’s worth of programming, and finds a near total lack of any kind of science. The one exception, sort of, are the police procedurals.

Not a single factual science programme on any of the channels available to everyone who has a television. However in the dramatic presentations it is clear what science is for: it is to help the police elucidate which American has killed which other American. It is also clear who becomes a scientist: people of eccentric appearance and manner with peculiarly arranged hair. They inhabit extremely modern, uncluttered and strangely lit laboratories, there is usually only one of them and he or she possesses an extraordinary range of scientific specialities and skills. They are sessile, but propel themselves on chairs which swivel and have small wheels, often making verbal ejaculations as they do.

It’s a growing genre, I fear: there are all these shows like Bones and the multitude of CSI spinoffs that portray this utterly bogus version of science as an enterprise that is all exceptionally well-funded, laden with glittering chrome and well-coifed and made up people, and everything is directly results-driven: like Chuck says, it’s all about catching the bad guy. It’s also very magical, that the wizards of the crime lab push a few buttons and get The Answer with impossible speed, and everyone bows down and accepts the authority of these faux scientists.

It’s a peeve of mine, too, so I’m pleased to see that Darwin and I share an opinion.

The question now is about how to get Hollywood and the television industry to portray science both accurately and as an intrinsically interesting process. Too often the media veer between two equally false portrayals: it’s either 1) a talking head reciting formulas at a camera, or 2) that boring science stuff is jettisoned for soap operas and crime set in a lab. At least the nature programs come a little closer to the idea, but even there they rarely couple the charismatic animals behaving wildly with the science that the observers are trying to work out.

My fellow academics, have you ever noticed that when our science students have problems with writing, we send them off to get tutorials from the people who know better, over in the English department? Our campus has a writing room where students can get advice from experts before they hand in their work to the science nerds. Unfortunately, there is no reciprocal arrangement: when English majors write about science, almost any claptrap can pass muster, we science nerds don’t provide remedial science education, and they don’t send their students to us to get their assertions vetted. This leads to distressing situations, like this account of a student who wrote a paper on evolution for a history class. The history TA marked up her paper with painfully stupid comments about the science of evolution. What can be done about this sort of thing?

Well, my first thought was that the next time I get a set of term papers (next week! Oh, no!) I’m going to grade them by insisting that “it’s” always gets an apostrophe, verb tenses are irrelevant and changing them frequently spices up a paper, and that anything written before the date of the author’s birth is old timey history and doesn’t need a citation, since they make it all up anyway. Sentences optional are. Speeeling ireluhvent. We is always at war with humanities and social sciences.

But no! Let’s acknowledge that both sides of the campus divide have essential contributions to make to one another! This is a case where Science ought to put on its best lab coat and stomp on over to History and set them straight, while recognizing that it would be a good thing for History (and Philosophy and English and Art usw) have grounds to tromp over and assail us over our philistine ways. Silence is the worst approach we could take.

Which actually makes this a nice segue into my announcement for the Café Scientifique, which represents an attempt to bridge the two cultures. It’s our last Café of the year, and we’ve got a couple of people from those buildings on the other side of the campus mall to join us in talking about how to communicate science. I’m really looking forward to this one; it’s not too late for the rest of you to book a flight and rent a car and make the trip on out to Morris for a splendid evening.

So, for that history TA who is ignorant of evolution, I’d say that one response ought to be that the science disciplines at that university make a routine effort to offer introductory lectures and discussions on core topics in the field, aimed at a general audience. I’d also like to see more explanations for us geeks on basics in other disciplines — if someone offered an evening “Idiot’s Guide to Post-modernism”, or similar grossly misunderstood topic, I’d go.

As always, the answer is more speech. Talk and share ideas.

John Horgan actually defended Ben Stein on Bloggingheads. Now I can understand being a little contrarian, but that’s going too far.

More importantly, I’ve been asked to do another bloggingheads session — it could be with John Horgan, and an opportunity to chastise him for that (as well as talk about something more substantive) or it could be with someone else — so I thought I’d throw it out here. Who do you think would be a good person for me to team up with for a diavlog? Maybe there’s someone out there who hasn’t been on bloggingheads you’d like to see.

Look what they’ve done: Philadelphia declares a whole Year of Evolution, a celebration starting on 19 April.

The YEAR OF EVOLUTION kicks off for the public on Saturday, April 19, as the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology opens Surviving: The Body of Evidence, a new exhibition which explores the process of evolution and its outcomes. Other public programs so far scheduled at the University of Pennsylvania include lectures by Donald Johanson, Director, Institute for Human Origins (May 2008), Spencer Wells, Project Director of the National Geographic Genographic Project (October 2008), Charles Darwin expert E. Janet Browne, author of the two-volume Charles Darwin: Voyaging and the Power of Place (November 2008), and renowned biologist Ken Miller (February 2009). Additional lectures, Penn Museum programs for children and families, scholarly symposia, and an evolution-focused freshman class book-reading selection, will round out the University’s rich offerings.

The Academy of Natural Sciences, The Franklin, the Philadelphia Zoo, the Mütter Museum and College of Physicians, and the American Philosophical Society Museum join with Penn Museum and the University, in offering programming in the coming year. Included in the public offerings are exhibitions about the work of geneticist Gregor Mendel (Academy of Natural Sciences), and Charles Darwin (American Philosophical Society Museum), as well as an evolutionary perspective on a medical collection (Mütter Museum). Related IMAX movie programs at The Franklin, and a closer look at our closest relatives–fellow primates–at the Philadelphia Zoo, are all part of the year.

Dr. Howard Goldfine, Professor of Microbiology, School of Medicine, and Dr. Michael Weisberg, Assistant Professor of Philosophy, School of Arts and Sciences, are co-chairs of the University’s YEAR OF EVOLUTION. Dr. Janet Monge, Acting Curator of Physical Anthropology, Penn Museum, and co-curator of the Surviving exhibition, was instrumental in organizing the city-wide effort.

This is how it is done, people! Organize a whole series of positive, informative events for your town, right now — you’ve fallen behind Philly!

Now I just need an excuse to visit…Philadelphia is a great old town that has just gotten better.

You know, I caught a plane at 5:20am this morning, had a long flight across the country followed by a 3 hour drive to get home, so I’m not exactly feeling pleasantly conducive to continuing the latest sanctimonious whine-fests from some of the people who share a server with me. I have been avoiding the various framing flare-ups around here, despite the fact that everyone of them seems to drag my name into the mix.

We appreciate your concern, it is noted and stupid.

I will defer to Greg and Russell and let them speak for me, since at this point, I really don’t give a damn about the issue. I will say this: if you think your role is to hector me about being someone else, you’re a clueless twit.

I am not Paul Kurtz. I am not Eugenie Scott. I am not Richard Dawkins. I am not your wonderful third grade teacher or the boy scout who helps little old ladies across the street, and I am not Jesus nor am I Satan. I’m me, and no one else, and I expect everyone else to be themselves. I am not practicing “identity politics”, since the only identity I have is my individuality and if there’s anything I want everyone to do it is to be able to be fierce and outspoken and say what they think. Or, as some of you obviously prefer, you can be as tepid and craven and milquetoastish as you want, and you can set your stars on being someone else and inoffensively following the crowd to your heart’s content.

But get over yourselves. That’s not my road, and I’m not following your directions, especially when they’re so goddamned boring and derivative.

I endorse this message. Enough said, right?