Scopes Monkey Trial, Part Deux - IT'S ON!

[bascule]

http://online.wsj.com/public/article/0,,SB112735391238948229-ZTudG5HjJNdXRKw00DSaiyOdZKc_20060921,00.html?mod=tff_main_tff_top

 

Debates about the boundaries of science and religion that marked the famous Scopes trial in 1925 are likely to unfold next week at a Harrisburg, Pa., federal courthouse in the first legal test of an anti-evolution doctrine known as "intelligent design."

 

Aided by the American Civil Liberties Union, 11 parents of Dover, Pa., schoolchildren have filed a federal lawsuit against that town's school board, accusing it of violating the principle of separation of church and state. The school board requires that at the beginning of the 9th grade unit on evolution, teachers are supposed to read a statement to a biology class: "Because Darwin's theory is a theory, it continues to be tested as new evidence is discovered. The theory is not a fact...Intelligent Design is an explanation of the origin of life that differs from Darwin's view."

 

Science teachers balked and many Dover parents were angered as well. The plaintiffs are asking the court to void the intelligent-design policy in the class.

 

The intelligent-design doctrine asserts that some natural processes are so complex and ingenious that they must have been created by an intelligent or supernatural cause -- perhaps God -- rather than the randomness of natural selection.

 

Kitzmiller et al. v. Dover Area School District is expected to draw national media attention as well as expert witnesses from Brown University and other prominent institutions. The trial, slated to last five weeks, will be monitored by scientists, educators and politicians around the country. The trial will not be televised.

 

The outcome is likely to influence state school boards in Kansas and Ohio, which have moved toward allowing teachers to critique Darwin's theory, as well as policies in many individual school districts. "The results of the Dover trial will be extremely significant for American public school education," said Eugenie Scott, executive director of the nonprofit National Center for Science Education, based in California, an organization that advocates teaching evolution and advised the plaintiff's team on science matters.

 

"If the judge rules in favor of the plaintiffs, then this will truly throw sand in the gears of efforts to get intelligent design taught at the high school level," said Ms. Scott. "If the judge rules...for the district, I think this will give a green light to school districts that would like to introduce some form of creationism in the classroom."

 

Will this finally bring an end to IDiots trying to teach religion in a science classroom? Only time will tell...

[ecoli]

Good for them. I wondered how long it would take for the scientific community to get off its ass and do something about this.