Intelligent Design Debate going on in Kansas

I am so embarassed:

Kansas Board Holding Evolution Hearings

By JOHN HANNA
The Associated Press
Saturday, May 7, 2005;
3:31 PM

TOPEKA, Kan. -- Witnesses trying to persuade Kansas officials to encourage
more criticism of evolution in public school classrooms are making statements
some scientists say betrayed creationist views.

Witnesses in a State Board of Education hearing on how the theory should be
taught also have acknowledged they hadn't fully read evolution-friendly science
standards proposed by educators. Nor had two of three presiding board
members.

A board subcommittee had a third consecutive day of hearings Saturday, with a
final day scheduled for Thursday. The entire board plans to consider changes in
June to standards that determine how Kansas students are on science.

State and national science groups are boycotting the hearings, viewing them
as rigged in favor of language backed by intelligent design advocates.

In turn, intelligent design advocates contend they've been portrayed unfairly
as advocating creationism. Intelligent design says some features of the natural
world are so complex and well-ordered that they're best explained by an
intelligent cause.

Repeatedly on Friday and Saturday, Topeka attorney Pedro Irigonegaray,
representing the drafters of the evolution-friendly standards, questioned
witnesses about their personal beliefs.

Witnesses said they didn't believe all life had a common origin or that man
evolved from earlier, ape-like creatures. Some said they accept the widespread
scientific conclusion that the Earth is about 4.5 billion years old, but two
said they believe it is between 5,000 and 100,000 years old.

Nancy Bryson, a biology instructor at Kennesaw State University in Georgia,
said having life appear from chemical molecules is "utterly impossible." Bryson
came under fire for giving a public lecture in 2003 criticizing evolution and
eventually lost her position as division science director at Mississippi
University for Women.

"In my personal opinion, I believe there is an intelligent designer," she
said.

Other scientists said such statements showed the witnesses' true motives _
opening up the science curriculum for religion.

"They're creationists first and scientists second," Robert Bowden, a Kansas
State University plant pathologist, said after Friday's hearing.

Witnesses said the language backed by intelligent design advocates would
allow freer debate in the classroom.

"Teachers should be actually encouraged to discuss these issues," said
Russell Carlson, a biochemist and molecular biologist at the University of
Georgia in Athens.

Irigonegaray repeatedly pointed out that witnesses had not fully read the
evolution-friendly proposal, which would continue the state's policy describing
the theory as a key concept for students to learn.

Board member Kathy Martin, of Clay Center, elicited groans of disbelief from
a few audience members when she acknowledged she had only scanned the proposal,
which is more than 100 pages. Later, board member Connie Morris, of St. Francis,
also said she had only scanned it.

Martin said during a break: "I'm not a word-for-word reader in this kind of
technical information."

Intelligent design advocates continued calling scholars, biologists and
chemists to attack evolutionary theory that all life arose from a common source
and that change in species over time can lead to new species.

Battles over evolution also have occurred in Michigan, Ohio and Pennsylvania
in the past few years.

In 1999, the Kansas State Board of Education, with a conservative majority _
including Abrams _ deleted most references to evolution in the science
standards. The next election led to a less conservative board, which adopted the
current standards. In last year's elections, conservatives captured a majority
again.

Irigonegaray hoped to show that intelligent design is a religious concept. He
asked Carlson, "In your opinion, the intelligent designer is God, is it
not?"

Carlson replied: "Well, yeah, I would agree with that."

Asked to explain the appearance of humans on Earth, witness John Sanford, an
associate professor of horticultural sciences at Cornell University, said: "My
explanation, humbly offered, is that we were specially created."

The board has sought to avoid comparisons between its hearings and the 1925
Scopes Monkey Trial in Dayton, Tenn., in which teacher John Scopes was convicted
of violating a state law against teaching evolution. However, both sides are
represented by attorneys, even if scientists refuse to testify for
evolution.

____

On the Net:

State Board of Education: http://www.ksbe.state.ks.us

Kansas Citizens for Science: http://www.kcfs.org

I kind of have that feeling you get when you take a new girlfriend to a family reunion and all of your relatives you haven't seen since you were a kid embarass the shit out of you.

Or maybe it's more similar to this experience I had. Fiona and Anka (Anka is German post-doc research scientist who lived above me, and Fiona was her roommate from New Zealand) invited me up to dinner before they moved out last semester. And I noticed a DVD of Luther they had and asked them how they liked it. Fiona said it was awesome, and then launched into a history of who Martin Luther was and how the Lutheran church was formed and what the Lutherans were about and how they were different from Catholics (but in the manner you would explain to a 7 year old) until finally I blurted out - "I'm Lutheran!" Okay...I haven't been to church since I was 7, but I was Baptized Lutheran and dammit I know who Martin Luther was.

Of course in a country that elects someone like Bush as a leader - it's probably safer to not expect to much from the local population if you're not from around here.

And when the topic of Creationists came up - they both spoke of Creationists as you would some exotic and rare bird that people had presumed was extinct. They still have those? Can we see them and take pictures? Do you think they will get upset if we ask them to pose with their Bibles? Like wow shit and gee-wizz. We knew some Americans were stupid and 60% of your children think Alaska is a little south of Mexico because that's the way they draw the maps, but there are actually people who want to outlaw the teaching of evolution?

*sigh*

Okay they didn't ask to take pictures. I made that up. But they were definitely in awe when I confirmed that there were actually quite a few people around who believed the Earth had been created only 6000 years ago. It really wasn't an urban myth spread among the rest of the world as an example of how stupid Americans are. Really.