Latest Challenges to the Teaching of Evolution

I have to respond. I'm sorry if I upset anyone H20Man excepted.

Creation science bill clears the Indiana Senate
(By Scott Elliott, Indy Star, February 1, 2012)

The Indiana Senate passed a bill Tuesday that would allow creationism to be taught in the classroom — an idea that, if it becomes law, could likely end up in a courtroom.

Senate Bill 89, authored by Sen. Dennis Kruse, R-Auburn, would allow schools to teach religion-based views on the origin of creation — be they Muslim, Jewish, Scientology or Christian — alongside the theory of evolution in public school science classes.

Schools, however, would not be required to do so, and an Indiana Department of Education spokesman said the state would not develop any such curriculum or guidelines for teaching creationism.

The Senate passed the bill 28-22. It would still need to be passed by the House and signed by Gov. Mitch Daniels before it became law.

“I believe in creation,” Kruse said, “and I believe it deserves to be taught in our public schools.”

Sen. Karen Tallian, D-Portage, had a decidedly different take: “I can’t believe we are even considering this.”

The question now — if it becomes law — is whether schools will consider it. And if they do, will that violate the Constitution?

Creation science was specifically ruled unconstitutional by the U.S. Supreme Court in a 1987 case in which the court voided a Louisiana law that required creation science to be taught alongside evolution in science class. The court found the law violated the establishment clause of the U.S. Constitution because it was designed to advance religion.

Kruse said he is aware of the precedent but isn’t sure it would survive today.

“This is a different Supreme Court,” he said. “This Supreme Court could rule differently.”

Sen. Tim Skinner, D-Terre Haute, asked whether Indiana is ready for the lengthy legal battle that could follow.

“If we get sued,” he asked, “who is going to pay for the lawsuit?”

The answer to Skinner’s question might help explain why Kruse felt the need to put creationism into state law.

Technically, a school district could teach creationism now — and some do.

“As far as I know,” said Mount Vernon Community School Corporation Superintendent William Riggs, “we’ve always been allowed to do that.”

Riggs said Mount Vernon High School’s biology class already teaches creationism alongside evolution. “We’ve been doing this for years.”

Riggs said the school teaches them as “two theories of the origins of life” and said that in literature classes students often learn about the Bible and the Quran. “The idea is to get kids to think.”

But districts such as Mount Vernon potentially open themselves up to costly lawsuits. Kruse’s bill gives those districts and any other that choose to teach creationism some legal cover — and likely would draw the state into their defense.

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Coincidentally, Tuesday’s vote came on the same day that the Fordham Foundation released a report that named Indiana as one of just seven states that earned an “A” for its science standards.

That might change.

“If this law passes, for the classrooms of Indiana, it would be a serious undermining of the teaching of evolution,” said Kathleen Porter-Magee, senior director of the High Quality Standards Project at the Thomas B. Fordham Institute.

The think tank, based in Washington, D.C., advocates for high academic standards and school choice.

In its report, Fordham said the challenges to evolution are among the biggest problems facing science standards today.

Adding creation science to state standards, Porter Magee said, would be a step in the wrong direction.

Francis Eberle, the executive director of the National Science Teachers Association, agrees.

“I understand that religious belief and faith is important,” he said. “We don’t dispute that in any fashion. Our position is that in the science classroom we should be teaching science.”

Kruse called evolution a “Johnny come lately” idea that emerged well after many religious views about the origins of life were formed.

“Many people still believe in creation,” he said. “Our schools are teaching what many people believe is false.”

Kruse thinks his bill is fair to everyone because it was amended to allow the creation theories of several religions, not just Christianity. But the inclusion of other religions was the reason Sen. Brent Steele, R-Bedford, said he voted against the measure.

Nine other Republicans voted against the bill, and one Democrat, Lindel Hume of Princeton, voted for it.

“This is a different Supreme Court,” he said. “This Supreme Court could rule differently.”

What a snide son of a bitch you are.

So tell, Mr. Smar-mouth ************, are bills attainder legal in England? Do the English ever "render" prisoners elsewhere to avoid habeas corpus?

A handwritten list included the names and addresses of the London mayor, Boris Johnson, two rabbis, the US embassy and the London Eye as potential targets to attack in the runup to Christmas 2010.

The group's alleged "linchpin" was Mohammed Chowdhury, a 21-year-old from east London, who pleaded guilty at Woolwich crown court to preparing to commit an act of terrorism.

He and eight other men from London, Cardiff and Stoke-on-Trent were due to face trial this week. At the last minute they admitted the terror plot, but denied the intention was to cause death or injury.

......As I have endeavoured to show in this volume, the deference of the old electors to their betters was the only way in which our old system could be maintained. No doubt countries can be imagined in which the mass of the electors would be thoroughly competent to form good opinions; approximations to that state happily exist.

.....there is a still worse case, a case which the life of George III.—which is a sort of museum of the defects of a constitutional king—suggests at once. The Parliament may be wiser than the people, and yet the king may be of the same mind with the people. During the last years of the American war, the Premier, Lord North, upon whom the first responsibility rested, was averse to continuing it, and knew it could not succeed. Parliament was much of the same mind; if Lord North had been able to come down to Parliament with a peace in his hand, Parliament would probably have rejoiced, and the nation under the guidance of Parliament, though saddened by its losses, probably would have been satisfied.

Evolution is the keystone to biology and to life on earth. And it may be the single most informative scientific discovery ever made. Several times now, when scientists from various disciplines are polled about the most valuable scientific discovery in human history, Evolution tops the list.

I don't know where you went to school, but it seems from your question that they really didn't do a very good job of introducing you to the ubiquitous value of evolutionary theory.

Meanwhile.............in Indiana..................

Quote:

Creation science bill clears the Indiana Senate
(By Scott Elliott, Indy Star, February 1, 2012)

Riggs said Mount Vernon High School’s biology class already teaches creationism alongside evolution. “We’ve been doing this for years.”

“I believe in creation,” Kruse said, “and I believe it deserves to be taught in our public schools.”

Mount Vernon High School’s biology class already teaches creationism alongside evolution. “We’ve been doing this for years.”

I can't wait until kids come home and tell their conservative Evangelical parents about how 75,000,000 years ago, Xenu headed the Galactic Federation, which was an organization of 76 planets that had already existed for 20,000,000 years. The planets were suffering a tremendous problem with overpopulation. Xenu's solution to the matter was to gather large numbers of people, kill them, freeze their thetans (souls), and transport the frozen thetans to Earth, which they called Teegeeack. The thetans were left in the vicinity of volcanoes, which were, in turn, destroyed in a series of nuclear explosions. The thetans who were captured and exploded on Earth are the origin of body thetans. Each human has his or her own thetan.