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Charles Darwin under siege in Tennessee, again
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By: Michael Stone
Humanist Examiner
Despite overwhelming objections from scientific authorities, a Tennessee bill that allows creationism in the science classrooms of public schools will become law.
Despite overwhelming objections from scientific authorities, a Tennessee bill that allows creationism in the science classrooms of public schools will become law.
On Tuesday, Tennessee Governor Bill Haslam refused to sign, but did not veto, a bill that will permit the religious doctrine of creationism to be considered in public school science classrooms along with the accepted scientific theory of evolution. By not acting, Haslem allows Tennessee's House Bill 368, known in the media as the “Monkee Bill,” to become law.
The legislation has been lampooned by scientists and those in the media as the "Monkey Bill" because it raises issues reminiscent of the famous Scopes "monkey trial" that took place almost a hundred years ago in Tennessee.
The bill will become law despite the strident 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, and that the bill is anti-evolution, anti‐scientific and very likely unconstitutional.
According to critics, the legislation incorrectly implies that there is a scientific controversy surrounding evolution. However, there is no such scientific controversy. The scientific theory of evolution is accepted by an overwhelming majority of mainstream scientists around the world as the cornerstone of biology. Evolution is the single, unifying scientific explanation for the diversity of life on earth, and the foundation upon which the biological sciences are built.
If there is a controversy about evolution, it is not scientific. The controversy is not about science, but religion. The fact is that once the theory of evolution is accepted, a literal, fundamentalist reading of Biblical creation is rendered untenable. Many Christian and other religious fundamentalists are simply unable to accept evolution as a scientific reality for this reason. Hence, they try to pass off Biblical creationism, or Intelligent Design, as legitimate competing scientific theories, when in reality they do not represent scientific thinking, but thinly veiled attempts to preserve religious superstitions.
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. Allowing the Monkey Bill to become law will result in Tennessee being forced to engage in costly and ultimately futile litigation, litigation the state will in all probability lose.
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