Allen Dvorak
04/16/09
Lawsuits have been filed recently in Georgia and Pennsylvania to protect evolutionists from evil creationists. Two civil-liberties groups sued a school district in Pennsylvania because of its intention to introduce the idea of "intelligent design" into the science curriculum as an alternate view of how life began. Under the school board’s directive, ninth-grade biology teachers would be required to read a statement to students to the effect that Darwin’s theory of evolution through natural selection is "not fact" and that some areas of the theory are not supported by evidence.
In Georgia, the lawsuit resulted from a disclaimer which the local school board (Cobb County) affixed to ninth-grade biology textbooks. The statement reads, in part: "Evolution is a theory, not a fact, regarding the origin of living things. This material should be approached with an open mind, studied carefully, and critically considered."
It’s not just scientists who have risen to the defense of the general theory of evolution. The executive director of Americans United for Separation of Church and State is a Reverend Barry Lynn. J. David Pleins is a professor at Santa Clara University who recently authored an article for the Mercury News in which he observed that "creation science is neither good science nor good religion" and proclaimed the Garden of Eden, Noah’s ark and the Tower of Babel as Bible myths. Did I mention that Santa Clara is a Catholic, Jesuit school in California’s Silicon Valley and Dr. Pleins is a professor of religious studies?
What has caused these vehement defenses of evolution? Throw a rock at the junk-yard dog and he hits the fence snarling in response. Supporters of evolution have been hit by several "rocks" in recent times. Many fair-minded scientists are "leaving the reservation" — individuals like Michael Behe, author of Darwin’s Black Box, professor of biochemistry and hardly a religious fanatic. Dr. Behe’s candid admissions in his book about the weaknesses of Darwinism illustrates the fact that the more we learn about the world as a result of more advanced technology, the harder it becomes for some to swallow the theory of evolution.
Another "rock" is the fact that much of the American public has come to doubt the truth of the theory of evolution. A Washington Post story (December 7, 2004, page A14) cited the results of a national Gallup Poll in which 35% of the respondents believed that evolution is well-supported by scientific evidence while 35% held the opposite opinion! The same article quoted the chairman of the Science Department in a Cobb County, Georgia high school as saying that the poll results prove that evolution is widely misunderstood. I guess if people weren’t so ignorant, they would believe in the theory!
Dr. Pleins wrote, "The inventor of the sticker (in Cobb County – asd) deserves an ‘F’ for getting the relationship between fact and theory wrong." Actually, it is Dr. Pleins who deserves an "F." He, like many other evolutionists, seems to think that theory equals fact.