TOPEKA, Kan. (ABP) — Kansas' state Board of Education has yet again reversed itself on standards for science teaching, removing the questioning of evolution from recommended state curricula.
By a 6-4 vote Feb. 14, the panel served another volley in what has become something of a biennial tennis match in the culture wars. The move reverses a 2005 vote of the board, which itself reversed an earlier vote. The latest action marks the fifth time in eight years the board has changed the state science curriculum.
The latest change in the standards was pushed by a coalition of Democrats and moderate Republicans elected to the Kansas board in November — including some who ran in Republican primaries against religious-conservative candidates. Many had run explicitly on the issue of removing the pro-intelligent design language from the standards.
What local school districts teach about evolution remains up to them. However, the vast majority of Kansas' public schools hew to such state standards because they delineate what students will be tested on in classes.
In 2005, the board voted 6-4 to add language to the standards asserting that widely accepted evolutionary principles were controversial and were being brought into question by new research.
Those who oppose evolutionary theory on religious grounds had pushed the changes. They also had the support of many who assert that “intelligent design” should be taught alongside evolution in public 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.
But intelligent-design advocates argue that a handful of respected scientists have expressed support for the theory, pointing to 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.
Meanwhile, many scientists and supporters of church-state separation contend 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.
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Read more:
Intelligent design advocates win one, lose one Nov. 8 (11/9/2005)