DOVER, Pa. (ABP) — The democratic process yielded one win and one loss Nov. 8 for advocates of a controversial theory about the origins of earthly life.
A bitterly divided Kansas Board of Education voted 6-4 to write new science standards for public schools which effectively require teaching doubts about the theory of evolution and which redefine “science” to allow room for non-natural phenomena.
Meanwhile, voters in Dover, Pa., ousted all eight members of the town's school board, which just a year ago voted to require biology teachers to mention the theory of “intelligent design” as an alternative to evolution. The policy is the subject of a federal lawsuit filed by local residents who believe it violates the Constitution by teaching a religious theory in public-school science classes.
The Kansas board's move “is great for science,” said John Bacon, a member of the panel's majority, according to the Kansas City Star. “It gets rid of a lot of the dogma that is taught in science class today.”
But Kansas Gov. Kathleen Sibelius (D) said the vote was bad for the state. “If we're going to continue to bring high-tech jobs to Kansas and move our state forward, we need to strengthen science standards, not weaken them,” she said in a statement issued after the vote. “It's time they got down to the real business of strengthening Kansas schools.”
Intelligent design holds that evolutionary theory alone cannot account for all of the complexities found in earth's life forms, and that such complexities suggest a guiding, intelligent force — or creator — at work in the development of life.
Most mainstream scientists say that, since the theory cannot be scientifically proven, it relies on faith and therefore should not be taught in public-school science classes.
For instance, the National Science Teachers' Association condemned the Kansas decision in a statement issued Nov. 9. “As teachers, we value and respect the religious beliefs of each and every student, but we must be able to teach science the way it should be taught — accurately,” the statement read. “Only then can we achieve our professional goal to prepare and inspire students to be tomorrow's educated citizens, innovative thinkers and great scientists.”
But intelligent-design advocates argue that a handful of respected scientists have expressed support for the theory, including evidence of “irreducible complexity” in biochemical systems. In other words, the existence of complex chemical and cellular structures is impossible to explain by evolution alone, advocates say.
But many scientists and supporters of church-state separation have argued that intelligent design is merely a gussied-up version of creationism — the belief that God created the world a few thousand years ago in six literal, 24-hour days. While some widely respected evolutionary scientists support intelligent design, many of the organizations and political advocates pushing for it to be taught in schools are groups that also have advocated creationism.
In Pennsylvania, the Dover lawsuit claims that the school board's 2004 move to require ninth-grade biology teachers to read a disclaimer before embarking on a unit about evolution unconstitutionally inserts religion into the classroom.
The statement says evolution is a “theory” in which “gaps exist for which there is no evidence.” It goes on to suggest that intelligent design is “an explanation of the origins of life that differs from [Charles] Darwin's view.”
The Dover trial, in federal district court, recently ended. The judge said he expects to render his decision in the next two months.
But even if he finds against the district — as many legal experts expect — the case may be moot. The eight school board members elected Nov. 8 ran on a platform of, among other things, reversing the board's decision that required the anti-evolution disclaimer.
“I think voters were tired of the trial, they were tired of intelligent design, they were tired of everything that this school board brought about,” Democrat Bernadette Reinking, one of the newly elected board members, told the New York Times.
If the judge in the Dover case rules against the policy, the new school board could decline to appeal the decision, or simply reverse the policy itself, rendering the lawsuit moot. Either outcome would be a defeat for intelligent-design advocates, who were hoping for a test case to explore the constitutional boundaries of such teaching in public schools.
But the Dover case may also suggest that the ballot box is where the controversy will ultimately be decided.
Such a political tug of war has evolved in Kansas, where in 1999 the state Board of Education first voted to restrict the teaching of evolution. The board faced a backlash from voters in 2000, who elected a coalition of Democrats and moderate Republicans who reversed the action. But conservative Republicans who support intelligent design won again in 2004, setting up the most recent decision on new science standards.
Nonetheless, intelligent-design opponents in Kansas point out, the pendulum may swing back to the middle again in 2006, when several members of the school board will be up for re-election.