Latest Challenges to the Teaching of Evolution

It is pretty obvious that the fact that constitutional interpretations are decided at the judicial level, which is part of federal machinery, will give the decisions a bias towards Federal consolidation whenever issues touching upon the boundaries of the spheres of competence between states and Federal Government.

Bills assert science only a theory
(By Sarah Palermo / Concord Monitor / February 10, 2012)

If Reps. Gary Hopper and Jerry Bergevin doubted they had won national attention this year with a pair of bills designed to change how evolution is taught in New Hampshire classrooms, they had only to look around them yesterday. Their legislation inspired a think tank to fly a representative in from Seattle to testify.

The House Education Committee heard testimony yesterday on a bill Hopper, a Weare Republican, proposed, calling for science teachers to "instruct pupils that proper scientific (inquiry) results from not committing to any one theory or hypothesis . . . and that scientific and technological innovations based on new evidence can challenge accepted scientific theories."

Bergevin, a Manchester Republican, proposed a bill that would require schools to teach evolution as a theory, and include "the theorists' political and ideological viewpoints and their position on the concept of atheism." The Education Committee is scheduled to hear testimony on that bill Tuesday, and vote on both next Thursday.

"A lot of the schools in our state and elsewhere are teaching scientific theories as if they are undisputed fact," Hopper said. "I don't think that's the right way to teach our children. The right way to teach our children is with a sense of wonder. If you don't show the pros and the cons of an idea, you're limiting what children can learn, limiting their sense of wonder."

Several committee members asked Hopper to justify the need for his bill, saying the issue could be handled by local school boards instead of the Legislature, and asking how the state would enforce such a rule.

"I think what you are getting at is scientific inquiry, . . . trying to ask that science teachers ask children to attack the major premise of any argument. . . . I think it's a very worthy and noble bill that you're putting forward, but I think it's already being done in our classrooms," said Rep. Mary Gorman, a Nashua Democrat.

"But teachers, regardless of district, should have some liberty to teach the contradictions to the status quo without having fear of retribution," Hopper said.

Hopper also said he would not mind if the committee changed the bill so it encourages, not requires, teachers discuss both sides of the debate.

After Hopper and Bergevin testified in favor of the bill and a few other New Hampshire residents spoke against it, the committee heard from Joshua Youngkin, the law and policy program officer with the Discovery Institute in Seattle, a conservative think tank that sponsors intelligent design programs for schools.

Youngkin traveled to Concord to support Hopper's bill and urge lawmakers to go further to protect teachers' academic freedom, which he and Hopper said is in danger.

"The Discovery Institute does express support to the spirit of the bill. A critical state of mind amongst high school students is appropriate . . . They should learn to address matters skeptically."

A 2005 profile of the group in the Seattle Times says it has worked with school boards to craft anti-evolution rules for small towns and entire states. According to the group's tax reports filed in 2009, it brought in and spent about $4.5 million in 2009.

The institute condemns legislation that promotes an overtly creationist or religious alternative to evolution, preferring to advocate for the inclusion of scientific objections. Since 2002, when the group worked with the Ohio Board of Education on curricular alternatives to evolution, it has used the rallying cry "teach the controversy."

"Teaching the controversy" avoids the religious connotations of creationism and intelligent design, but calls on lawmakers to require teachers spend equal time discussing evidence for and against evolution.

Hopper's bill only requires teachers to address the fact that science is a field where new discoveries will be made. But the state should be more specific, and explicitly allow teachers to address challenges people have made to evolutionary science, Youngkin said, listing teachers in Washington, Minnesota and Texas who lost their jobs over the issue.

"There is a great deal of (uncertainty) of what teachers can teach about scientific controversy. . . . You can pass academic freedom legislation and protect teachers to teach both sides of every academic controversy in a critical manner," he said.

Dale Roy, a former high school science teacher who lives in Hillsboro, testified that she didn't support the bill. Her former district asked her to follow the state framework for appropriate curricula by grade level but didn't mandate what topics she should cover, or how she should address student questions about evolution.

She used the textbook as a tool and supplemented it with more current scientific articles and research, but still, students often asked about things outside the purview of her classroom, like what existed before or caused the Big Bang, Roy said.

"The answer I have to give is, 'I don't know,' and you know what, science doesn't know, and it's okay," she said.

Her objection to Hopper's bill was a concern it would release a flood of information, not all of it equally researched or empirical.

"According to this, if one lone scientist in his backyard found something, I'm supposed to teach that to my students and present it with equal weight to something established by the consensus," she said.

And, yes, said another former science teacher, some scientific theories are established and vetted by a consensus.

John Godfrey of Pembroke, a retired teacher and representative of the New Hampshire Science Teachers Association, said there is no scientific debate on the veracity of evolution.

He described scientific theories as sitting along a broad spectrum. At one end, theories of religious or philosophical nature can't be proven by empirical research.

At the other, "there's what we're really sure of," he said.

The theories at that end have been put through experiments and tests, and are supported and sometimes modified based on measurable data.

"If you have the data, you're going to win arguments. You're going to win the day," he said. "Does the majority of the scientific community believe in evolution? Yes."

"To enact legislation requiring teachers to instruct that you cannot commit to any one theory no matter how firmly it appears to be accepted, just doesn't fit with what we know about theories. They go the gamut from purely theoretical to wow, this has been proven out time after time after time and we believe it to be so."

"There's lots of things in science we really know and we can teach the kids, here's what scientists have figured out, and we pretty much agree. Don't deprive them of that and say, 'Maybe yes, and maybe no. Go figure it out for yourself.' "

Sometimes you sling senetences together from parts of bad dreams or reading newspapares on the bottoms of canary cages.

You havent a clue of what you speak, thats the funny part.

. Youve been talking hash here.

If anything , ENgland is the least that Id expect to take up and challenge an internal grievance by such "tough talk" as you are posing to do. Youre a pussy and you know it. Your courage comes from a tankard not convictions.

John Godfrey of Pembroke, a retired teacher and representative of the New Hampshire Science Teachers Association, said there is no scientific debate on the veracity of evolution.

He described scientific theories as sitting along a broad spectrum. At one end, theories of religious or philosophical nature can't be proven by empirical research.

At the other, "there's what we're really sure of," he said.

Ill bet that rosborne is really proud of his state of New Hamster

For clarification, is it scientifically valid to practice scientific methodology?