EVOLUTION is once more under
attack in Kansas schools from
what pro-science groups have
branded a creationist "show trial".
Six conservative Christians on
the state's 10-member board of
education want state school
standards to admit alternatives
to evolution. This week public
hearings in Topeka are being
concluded, at which advocates of
"intelligent design" argued that
life is too complex to have arisen
entirely by natural processes, and
so requires a designer.
The US prohibits teaching
certain religions in state schools,
but supporters of intelligent
design claim it is science. Even so,
a witness in Topeka admitted that
the Judeo-Christian God is the
intelligent designer. And lawyer
John Calvert for the witnesses
charged that science is itself
"Endorsing an ideology" - atheism.
The Kansas Academy of
Science and other pro-science
groups boycotted what they called
"Show-trial hearings, whose
purpose is to make it appear that
intelligent-design creationism
and the well-established science
of evolution are on equal footing."
Pedro Irigonegaray, a lawyer for
scientists at the hearings, says,
"We should not allow the minority
to hijack education and send it
back to the 16th century".
In 1999 the Kansas board of
education adopted standards for
schools that called for children to
be taught alternatives to evolution.
These were reversed in 2001 after
a new board was elected.
New Scientist 14 May 2005 Page 4
"Creationism Fight"