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This is the preequel to Amanda's posting about stickers.


Martin

Outside View: Creation sticker shock
By Eugenia Scott, Glenn Branch and Nicholas Matzke
Outside View Commentators
  Published 1/18/2005 1:54 AM

OAKLAND, Calif., Jan. 18 (UPI) -- When biology 
students in Cobb County, Ga., open their 
textbooks, they find a small white sticker that 
says: "This textbook contains material on 
evolution. 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."

  Next year, students looking at the same 
textbooks will find a blank space where the 
sticker was. On Jan. 13, U.S. District Court 
Judge Clarence Cooper in Atlanta ruled the 
disclaimer was unconstitutional and ordered it 
removed.

  In 2002, Cobb County teachers selected a biology 
textbook that contained comprehensive coverage of 
evolution in order to comply with new state 
science education standards. To no one's 
surprise, parents protested. Cobb County has, for 
decades, had recurring tussles over the teaching 
of evolution, spearheaded by conservative 
Christians who make no bones about their 
religious motivation. The board of education 
tried to placate them by pasting the disclaimer 
-- rather like a cigarette warning label -- in 
textbooks.

  Jeffery Selman, a Cobb County parent, sued the 
district because he felt that the disclaimer 
promoted creationism. He is right.

  The Cobb County "theory not fact" disclaimer 
comes from a long line of creationist-inspired 
disclaimers and policies. A 1974 Texas textbook 
disclaimer proclaimed that "material on evolution 
included in the book is clearly presented as 
theory rather than verified." In 1996, the 
Tennessee Legislature barely defeated a bill 
stating, "any teacher or administrator teaching 
(the theory of evolution) as fact commits 
insubordination ... and shall be dismissed or 
suspended."

  The most infamous and widely copied disclaimer 
is Alabama's 1995 "theory not fact" sticker which 
included bullet points of creationist junk 
science. Texas textbooks carried disclaimers for 
10 years, until the attorney general declared 
such stickers were unconstitutional because 
school boards pass such disclaimers and policies 
to appease religious conservatives and to promote 
creationism, rather than to serve an educational 
purpose.

  Cobb County could have saved itself a lot of 
trouble and expense if it had listened to what 
the Texas attorney wrote in 1984. 
Government-sponsored anti-evolution disclaimers 
are unconstitutional and bad science. They 
encourage a belief in special creation and 
mislead students about the nature of science and 
the solid position of evolution among scientific 
theories. One hears often in the debate that 
"evolution is only a theory" -- meaning that 
evolution is an unsubstantiated guess -- but the 
National Academy of Sciences defines theory as an 
"explanation of some aspect of the natural world 
that can incorporate facts, laws, inferences, and 
tested hypotheses."

  Think about it: theories incorporate facts, laws 
and hypotheses. They are the central unifying 
backbones of disciplines. Just as relativity and 
quantum mechanics are the backbone of physics, 
and plate tectonics is the backbone of geology, 
evolution is the backbone of biology. We're glad 
evolution is a theory: it makes it much more 
important than a fact. But of course, "theory not 
fact" disclaimers assume very different 
definitions of these terms than those used by 
scientists.

  Equating evolution with atheism, creationists 
believe that students taught evolution may 
abandon their faith, or at least find it 
weakened. Speaking of the creationism/evolution 
controversy, intelligent-design proponent Phillip 
Johnson said, "The subject is not just the theory 
of evolution, the subject is the reality of God."

  Guided by law review articles tracing the 
history of creationism as well as testimony from 
scientists, Cooper wrote, "By denigrating 
evolution, the School Board appears to be 
endorsing the well-known prevailing alternative 
theory, creationism or variations thereof." 
Public school classrooms should be neutral on the 
subject of religion; the teaching of creationism 
in science class unconstitutionally promotes 
religion, violating this neutrality. Cooper made 
a good call.

  What will happen next? It's easy to predict that 
school boards will abandon "theory not fact" 
wording, but not disclaimers, which are popular 
with school boards: they give the appearance that 
elected officials are "doing something about 
evolution," thus assuaging concerns of an 
important political constituency, and they don't 
cost much. Anticipate new disclaimers and other 
anti-evolution policies that don't use "theory 
not fact" language but which nonetheless will 
promote teaching that evolution is bad science.

  Policies promoting teaching the evidence against 
evolution, or the strengths and weaknesses of 
evolution, or as in the Dover, Pa., school 
district policy next to be challenged in U.S. 
District Court, teaching the "gaps/problems in 
evolution" are already in evidence. Except that 
scientists don't know of any evidence against the 
inference that living things have common ancestry.

  Evolution happened. There are unsolved problems 
in evolution, to be sure, but they are hardly 
weaknesses; every scientific theory has unsolved 
problems, and they keep scientists happily busy. 
Scientists argue about the details of evolution, 
not about whether living things had common 
ancestors. To be scientifically literate, 
students should learn evolution.

  As President Bush's science adviser John H. 
Marburger III wrote last March, "Evolution is a 
cornerstone of modern biology"; students deserve 
to learn it uncompromised by disclaimers or phony 
evidence against evolution. We hope that in the 
next creationism trial, in Pennsylvania, another 
judge will see that evidence against evolution" 
policies, like "theory not fact" policies are 
also a manifestation of creationism.

  --

  (Eugenia Scott, Glenn Branch, and Nicholas 
Matzke are employed at the National Center for 
Science Education, Inc., which defends the 
teaching of evolution in public schools.)

  --

  (United Press International's "Outside View" 
commentaries are written by outside contributors 
who specialize in a variety of issues. The views 
expressed do not necessarily reflect those of 
United Press International. In the interests of 
creating an open forum, original submissions are 
invited.)

Copyright © 2001-2005 United Press International




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