The much-touted PBS Evolution series is beautifully produced and deals with a topic of broad interest. With so much going for this video production, including a multimillion-dollar budget funded by Paul Allen of Microsoft fame, it is unfortunate that Darwinian evolution and modern science are not accurately portrayed. Instead, a biased and inaccurate picture of Darwinism is presented along with stereotypes of those who support its conclusions together with those who oppose it. Doctrinal blinders worn by the producers have resulted in serious flaws including historical inaccuracies, erroneous science, omission of varying opinions within the scientific community and clear flaws in logic. The first episode does, however, make a most important concession: Darwinian evolution is, at its core, a religious vision.

The producer's commitment to Darwinism has led them to manipulate historical facts. A good example of this manipulation takes place in the opening scene of episode 1, "Darwin’s Dangerous Idea.” In this scene, Captain Robert Fitzroy, caricatured as a religious zealot, explodes at the first hint that may doubt the Biblical flood. As is commonly the case in historical dramas this scene is completely fictitious. A little artistic license could be forgiven if the scene was not antithetical to the record left by left by both Darwin and Fitzroy. During his time on HMS Beagle, Fitzroy recorded personal doubts about the flood and thus the veracity of the Biblical record (Browne, 1995). Far from being a religious zealot, while on the Beagle Fitzroy held uncertain theological views, particularly as they relate to natural history. Darwin's own record of his South American adventures does not support the thesis that he was a worldly-wise skeptic of religion. Writing from South America to his clergyman friend W. D. Fox, Darwin (1832) commented on his discovery of extinct mammals: "An old piece of ambition of mine has been gratified, vis finding the remains of large extinct animals I think some of them are new; I have teeth & fragments of about 7 kinds." Amazingly, later in the same paragraph he goes on to say: "I hope my wanderings will not unfit me for a quiet life, like you a country Clergyman." Darwin had a degree in theology.) Touchingly, the letter is signed, "God bless." There is no historical record of the fictional scene following Fitzroy’s explosion in which Darwin flippantly rolls his eyes as Fitzroy loudly reads scripture on the deck of the Beagle. In fact, after visiting Tahiti later in the voyage Darwin (1835) wrote to his sister Caroline: "The Captain & all on board (whose opinions are worth anything) have come to a very decided conclusion on the high merit of the Missionaries... I am sure we have seen that much good has been done & scarcely anyone pretends that harm has ever been effected. It was a striking thing to behold my guides in the mountain, before laying themselves down to sleep, fall on their knees & utter with apparent sincerity a prayer in their native tongue." These are hardly the words of a man flippant about religion or irritated with Captain Fitzroy. Even later on in life, after rejecting traditional religion, Darwin wrote in his autobiography, “Whilst on board the Beagle I was quite orthodox, and I remember being heartily laughed at by several of the officers (though themselves orthodox) for quoting the Bible as an unanswerable authority on some point of morality.” Darwin 1958).

It takes genuine commitment to the producers’ specific viewpoint to shoehorn Darwin’s written legacy into the fictitious opening scenes of the PBS Evolution series. But does this perspective taint their presentation of scientific data? The answer is profound and undeniable – yes, it does. The documentary cites serious inaccuracies as scientific evidence supporting Darwin's ideas. A glaring example of this is presentation of the universal genetic code as evidence of common ancestry. In reality there are several variations on what was once thought to be a universal code. This has been known at least since the late 1970s. New variations on the code are cataloged at the National Center for Biotechnology Information (see http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/htbin-post/Taxonomy/wprintgc?mode=c) where 17 variant codes are currently listed. If the genetic code is not truly universal and yet still provides evidence of common ancestry, this should have been explained; otherwise, variation in the genetic code might be viewed as powerful evidence against the theory. Easily documented lack of accuracy, in both its portrayal of history and scientific data, calls into question the overall accuracy of the series and its conclusions.

Some facts cited as evidence supporting common ancestry appear to be accurate, but do not logically support the theory. An example of this is the presence of homeotic genes in a wide spectrum of organisms. These genes serve as switches during development, playing a vital role in determining an organism's final structure. Antennapedia, a mutation in fruit flies (Drosophila), provides dramatic evidence of the way these genes work. In this mutation, flies grow legs instead of antennae from their heads. The gene mutated to achieve this dramatic outcome is found in organisms with fundamentally different body plans, ranging from worms to insects to humans. According to the Darwinian spin, homeotic genes explain how, through relatively few mutations, fundamentally different body plans could have evolved from a common ancestor. But this does not follow from the data. The basic body plan of animals is determined before these genes are turned on in the embryo. Furthermore, the same genes produce different body parts in different animals. For example, the antennapedia gene from a mouse can be inserted into a fly that lacks its own antennapedia gene, but the result is fly structures, not mouse structures.

Significantly, mutation of homeotic genes produces cripples, not forerunners of new and better animals. Mutant flies are in no way more "fit" than non-mutant members of the same species, in fact they are typically grotesquely less fit. In the case of antennapedia flies, no new structures are made; the opposite happens, antennae are lost. This mutation, like so many others, represents a loss not a gain. Evolution of the type Darwin envisaged, from bacteria to Bactrian camels, requires production of new genetic information coding for new and novel structures in organisms. Mutating genes that turn other genes off and on does not provide this new information.

Confusion about meaning of the term "evolution" is evident throughout the PBS series. In general any variation within a species is treated as evidence of evolution. Even variation within Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) is viewed as evidence that antelopes evolved from amoebas. This is clearly disingenuous, as variation within species has never been at the heart of the debate over Darwinian evolution. Rather, Darwin's theory was revolutionary because it hypothesized that new species can arise from existing species and that all current organisms evolved from a single common ancestor. The PBS Evolution series does not provide a single example to support this central pillar of Darwinian evolution. Providing evidence of intra-species variation to support inter-species evolution is comparing apples with oranges.

Befuddled terminology, confused logic, manipulation of the historical record and scientific inaccuracies represent only a partial list of problems evident in the PBS series. The series contains a fault common in material designed to indoctrinate - it only presents one side of the issue and restrictively frames the argument to achieve a predetermined outcome. Thus, honest debate within the community of evolutionary scientists is not documented. A distorted view of science is presented in which scientists are inaccurately and disturbingly depicted in lock-step agreement. This is unfortunate as an opportunity is missed to show the dynamic and diverse nature of evolutionary ideas by contrasting, for example, the views of Richard Dawkins and Stephen J. Gould or Louis Leakey and Donald Johansen.

Those who oppose the veracity of Darwin's theory are stereotyped, along with the unfairly portrayed Captain Fitzroy, as religious fanatics. This creates a false dialectic in which evolution, cloaked in the mantle of science, can only be opposed on religious and not scientific grounds. Those who oppose Darwinism on scientific grounds and not religious grounds are ignored, giving the fictitious impression that evolution is immune to scientific questioning. This impression is reinforced by omission of scientific data that appears to run counter to predictions made by Darwin's theory.

There is one area in which the PBS Evolution series deserves high praise and that is in its ready admission that "For all of us, the future of religion, science and science education are at stake in the creation-evolution debate." The debate about evolution does have a scientific component to it, but it is also, at its core, about religion.

Darwin is accurately depicted as a loving family man who experienced a crisis of faith following the death of his daughter Annie. The problem of evil genuinely troubled the divinity school trained Darwin and can reasonably be argued to have impacted his view of nature and God. James Moore is refreshingly open and accurate when, at the end of the first episode, he says, Darwin's vision of nature was, I believe, fundamentally a religious vision.

It is precisely because Darwinian evolution is fundamentally a religious viewpoint that the way it is taught, particularly in public schools, must be approached with extreme caution. For this reason, if for no other, the aim of the producers to introduce this piece of evangelical evolutionism into classrooms should be viewed as a fundamental violation of the principle that public schools should not be used for religious indoctrination. If this series is used for educational purposes, its best use would be as an example of science fiction in drama or English class; it could be put to no good use in science or history class rooms.

Literature Cited

Browne, Janet, 1995. Charles Darwin, Voyaging: Volume I of a Biography. New York, pp. 272-273
Darwin, C. 1832. Letter to W. D. Fox [12-13] November 1832. In The Correspondence of Charles Darwin. Edited by F. Burkhardt and S. Smith. Cambridge University Press, London., Vol. 1 pp 471, 472.
Darwin, C. 1835. Letter to Caroline Darwin, 27 December 1835. In The Correspondence of Charles Darwin. Edited by F. Burkhardt and S. Smith. Cambridge University Press, London, Vol. 1 pp 285, 286.
Darwin, C. 1958. The Autobiography of Charles Darwin 1809-1882. Edited by Nora Barlow. W. W. Norton and Co. New York, p85.

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