Religious right fights science for the heart of America
http://www.guardian.co.uk/usa/story/0,12271,1407422,00.html
Creationists take their challenge to evolution theory into the
classroom
Suzanne Goldenberg in Kansas City
Monday February 7, 2005
The Guardian
Al Frisby has spent the better part of his life in rooms filled with
rebellious teenagers, but the last years have been particularly trying
for the high school biology teacher. He has met parents who want him to
teach that God created Eve out of Adam's rib, and then then adjusted
the chromosomes to make her a woman, and who insist that Noah invited
dinosaurs aboard the ark. And it is getting more difficult to keep such
talk out of the classroom.
"Somewhere along the line, the students have been told the theory of
evolution is not valid," he said. "In the last few years, I've had
students question my teaching about cell classification and genetics,
and there have been a number of comments from students saying: 'Didn't
God do that'?" In Kansas, the geographical centre of America, the heart
of the American heartland, the state-approved answer might soon be Yes.
In the coming weeks, state educators will decide on proposed curriculum
changes for high school science put forward by subscribers to the
notion of "intelligent design", a modern version of creationism. If the
religious right has its way, and it is a powerful force in Kansas, high
school science teachers could be teaching creationist material by next
September, charting an important victory in America's modern-day revolt
against evolutionary science.
Suzanne Goldenberg
http://groups-beta.google.com/group/alt.atheism/msg/8add33a8d17718ad
http://snipurl.com/82n0
http://snipurl.com/82mz
Religious right
http://groups-beta.google.com/group/alt.atheism/msg/8ba03c3be221ade4
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