Creationists and Strauss

I was sent a link about a week ago now to a creationist video entitled "Creation is a Scientific Fact". I am led to believe that this is just the first in a series of videos, but my point is not to de-construct their reasoning of why they believe Creation is a Scientific fact, but I would like to simply point out something which I found rather ironic and amusing.


In the opening screen of the video they play the words "In the beginning, God made the heavens and the earth.. etc. etc. etc." along with some images of stars exploding and such. To dramatise their opening credits they used a famous segment of a piece of music by Richard Strauss called 'Also sprach Zarathustra' (English: Thus Spoke Zarathustra). For those not familiar with the piece, or with Strauss' work in general, you would almost certainly recognise it as the music from the opening scene of the Stanley Kubrick film '2001: A Space Odyssey'. A film that champions the advancement of science, acknowledging the evolution of human beings. If that wasn't irony enough, Strauss' piece was directly inspired by Nietzsche's novel by the same name. Nietzsche's novel is written in the style of some Biblical texts, but presents ideas which are explicitly opposed to the Christian belief system, god and idea of morality.


Who knows, perhaps they planned to use the music because of its familiarity within the realm of science, but I thought it was noteworthy to point out that they are using a piece of music made famous by a film that promoted a worldview that is diametrically opposed to their position, that was written by a composer who was inspired by perhaps the foremost anti-Christian philosopher in history. Even if they intended it to be this way, it sure looks like a failure to me.

Here's a link to the creationist video.


For those who don't want to watch the creationist video, but just want to hear the epic introduction to Also sprach Zarathustra here is the famous performance of it that was used in 2001: A Space Odyssey.

Speaking of films... Genesis???

I heard recently that Paramount Pictures are producing a film version of the Genesis creation account. The story is really not that interesting and I'm really not sure how it will pan out as a full-length feature film. I'm hoping this film sparks up a whole new creation-evolution 'controversy', because it gives science an opportunity to set the facts straight.

Source

IMAX: Hubble 3D

I just found out that the latest NASA trip to the Hubble space telescope to upgrade it, was all captured on film. Not just any film though, IMAX 3D film. The documentary is being played at IMAX and IMAX-3D theaters starting March 19. This is one you don't want to miss!

More information can be found here.

Milk

No I'm not talking about the liquid substance we put on our cereal.
I'm talking about the film Milk. Starring Sean Penn and James Franco.
The movie tells the story of the last 8 years of Harvey Milk's life. For those that don't know, Harvey Milk was a gay activist, and the first openly gay person to be elected to local government in California.
Anyway, this movie is really inspiring and I thoroughly recommend watching it.

It's quite possibly Sean Penn's best performance yet in any film, right up there with I am Sam.