Tennessee Senate rejects science, promotes creationism in public schools
The Tennessee state Senate is trying to smuggle creationism into the public school science classroom, again.
Earlier this week the state Senate approved a bill that critics claim is an attempt to allow non‐scientific alternatives to evolution (such as creationism and intelligent design) to be introduced into public schools.
The State Senate passed the bill late Monday evening, despite the objections of the Tennessee Science Teachers Association, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the American Civil Liberties Union of Tennessee, the American Institute for Biological Sciences, the Knoxville News Sentinel, the Nashville Tennessean, the National Association of Geoscience Teachers, and the National Earth Science Teachers Association.
Supporters of the legislation claim the legislation would encourage teachers and students to debate evolution in the classroom. However, critics claim there is nothing to debate. Further, the bill is unnecessary, anti‐scientific and very likely unconstitutional.
The proposed legislation implies that there is a scientific controversy surrounding evolution. There is not. The scientific theory of evolution is accepted by mainstream scientists around the world as the cornerstone of biology. Evolution is the single, unifying explanation for the diversity of life on earth.
If there is a controversy, it is not a scientific controversy. Rather, the controversy seems to be a failure on the part of Christian fundamentalists to accept evolution as a scientific reality, and the foundation upon which the biological sciences are built.
Science is rigorous. Somethings are not up for debate. 2 + 2 = 4. The earth is a sphere, not a plane. Scientific theories must provide natural and testable explanations. Creationism and intelligent design provide neither. Both invoke supernatural causes (e.g. God, or some unspecified "intelligent designer") that cannot be tested by the tools of science (e.g. no one can disprove the existence of God). These ideas, neither natural, nor testable, are unscientific, and incompatible with science.
Creationism and intelligent design are both religiously motivated notions that may find a place in a theology, literature, comparative religion or philosophy class, but have no business in the science classroom. Teaching either creationism or intelligent design as science is academic malpractice.
The fact is, teaching creationism or intelligent design as science in a public school classroom represents a clear violation the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.
The assumption that creationism, or intelligent design, constitutes a legitimate scientific alternative to the theory of evolution, is false. To teach children otherwise borders upon child abuse. Religious myth and superstition have no place in the public school science classroom.
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Earlier this week the state Senate approved a bill that critics claim is an attempt to allow non‐scientific alternatives to evolution (such as creationism and intelligent design) to be introduced into public schools.
The State Senate passed the bill late Monday evening, despite the objections of the Tennessee Science Teachers Association, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the American Civil Liberties Union of Tennessee, the American Institute for Biological Sciences, the Knoxville News Sentinel, the Nashville Tennessean, the National Association of Geoscience Teachers, and the National Earth Science Teachers Association.
Supporters of the legislation claim the legislation would encourage teachers and students to debate evolution in the classroom. However, critics claim there is nothing to debate. Further, the bill is unnecessary, anti‐scientific and very likely unconstitutional.
The proposed legislation implies that there is a scientific controversy surrounding evolution. There is not. The scientific theory of evolution is accepted by mainstream scientists around the world as the cornerstone of biology. Evolution is the single, unifying explanation for the diversity of life on earth.
If there is a controversy, it is not a scientific controversy. Rather, the controversy seems to be a failure on the part of Christian fundamentalists to accept evolution as a scientific reality, and the foundation upon which the biological sciences are built.
Science is rigorous. Somethings are not up for debate. 2 + 2 = 4. The earth is a sphere, not a plane. Scientific theories must provide natural and testable explanations. Creationism and intelligent design provide neither. Both invoke supernatural causes (e.g. God, or some unspecified "intelligent designer") that cannot be tested by the tools of science (e.g. no one can disprove the existence of God). These ideas, neither natural, nor testable, are unscientific, and incompatible with science.
Creationism and intelligent design are both religiously motivated notions that may find a place in a theology, literature, comparative religion or philosophy class, but have no business in the science classroom. Teaching either creationism or intelligent design as science is academic malpractice.
The fact is, teaching creationism or intelligent design as science in a public school classroom represents a clear violation the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.
The assumption that creationism, or intelligent design, constitutes a legitimate scientific alternative to the theory of evolution, is false. To teach children otherwise borders upon child abuse. Religious myth and superstition have no place in the public school science classroom.
Source