Posted on 12/11/2002 6:28:08 AM PST by A2J
By WILL SENTELL
wsentell@theadvocate.com
Capitol news bureau
High school biology textbooks would include a disclaimer that evolution is only a theory under a change approved Tuesday by a committee of the state's top school board.
If the disclaimer wins final approval, it would apparently make Louisiana just the second state in the nation with such a provision. The other is Alabama, which is the model for the disclaimer backers want in Louisiana.
Alabama approved its policy six or seven years ago after extensive controversy that included questions over the religious overtones of the issue.
The change approved Tuesday requires Louisiana education officials to check on details for getting publishers to add the disclaimer to biology textbooks.
It won approval in the board's Student and School Standards/ Instruction Committee after a sometimes contentious session.
"I don't believe I evolved from some primate," said Jim Stafford, a board member from Monroe. Stafford said evolution should be offered as a theory, not fact.
Whether the proposal will win approval by the full state Board of Elementary and Secondary Education on Thursday is unclear.
Paul Pastorek of New Orleans, president of the board, said he will oppose the addition.
"I am not prepared to go back to the Dark Ages," Pastorek said.
"I don't think state boards should dictate editorial content of school textbooks," he said. "We shouldn't be involved with that."
Donna Contois of Metairie, chairwoman of the committee that approved the change, said afterward she could not say whether it will win approval by the full board.
The disclaimer under consideration says the theory of evolution "still leaves many unanswered questions about the origin of life.
"Study hard and keep an open mind," it says. "Someday you may contribute to the theories of how living things appeared on earth."
Backers say the addition would be inserted in the front of biology textbooks used by students in grades 9-12, possibly next fall.
The issue surfaced when a committee of the board prepared to approve dozens of textbooks used by both public and nonpublic schools. The list was recommended by a separate panel that reviews textbooks every seven years.
A handful of citizens, one armed with a copy of Charles Darwin's "Origin of the Species," complained that biology textbooks used now are one-sided in promoting evolution uncritically and are riddled with factual errors.
"If we give them all the facts to make up their mind, we have educated them," Darrell White of Baton Rouge said of students. "Otherwise we have indoctrinated them."
Darwin wrote that individuals with certain characteristics enjoy an edge over their peers and life forms developed gradually millions of years ago.
Backers bristled at suggestions that they favor the teaching of creationism, which says that life began about 6,000 years ago in a process described in the Bible's Book of Genesis.
White said he is the father of seven children, including a 10th-grader at a public high school in Baton Rouge.
He said he reviewed 21 science textbooks for use by middle and high school students. White called Darwin's book "racist and sexist" and said students are entitled to know more about controversy that swirls around the theory.
"If nothing else, put a disclaimer in the front of the textbooks," White said.
John Oller Jr., a professor at the University of Louisiana-Lafayette, also criticized the accuracy of science textbooks under review. Oller said he was appearing on behalf of the Louisiana Family Forum, a Christian lobbying group.
Oller said the state should force publishers to offer alternatives, correct mistakes in textbooks and fill in gaps in science teachings. "We are talking about major falsehoods that should be addressed," he said.
Linda Johnson of Plaquemine, a member of the board, said she supports the change. Johnson said the new message of evolution "will encourage students to go after the facts."
Dakmar...
I took a few minutes to decipher that post, and I must say I agree with a lot of what you said.
fC...
These were the Classical liberals...founding fathers-PRINCIPLES---stable/SANE scientific reality/society---industrial progress...moral/social character-values(private/personal) GROWTH(limited NON-intrusive PC Govt/religion---schools)!
Dakmar...
Where you and I diverge is on the Evolution/Communism thing. You seem to view Darwin and evolution as the beginning of the end for enlighted, moral civilization, while I think Marx, class struggle, and the "dictatorship of the proletariat" are the true dangers.
God bless you, I think we both have a common enemy in the BRAVE-NWO.
452 posted on 9/7/02 8:54 PM Pacific by Dakmar
This is a valid point. I cannot say that the penchant for communists to adopt evolutionism thereby invalidates theories of evolution. Communism exists and is widely recognized as a legitimate form of government. Evolutionism exists and is widely recognized as a legitimate world view. Do you suppose the two just randomly decided to walk hand in hand?
But we're not talking about a "potential" misapplication here, are we? It really happened, and it can be fairly well verified that millions of people lost their lives as a result.
How would you describe the relationship between evolutionism, communism, and the general welfare of the citizenry under the same? Would you say there is no relationship whatsoever?
If you saw them, it would indicate that the "scientists" at the "creation science" centers were actually doing research, instead of peddling comic books and making a living on the creationism lecture circuit. But relax. As soon as genuine scientists come up with something new -- say a new hominid fossil or a new transitional fossil, the creationoids will have a "new" argument -- that the newly-discovered evidence is a fake. That way, as true science progresses, the creationoids are supplied with a never-ending supply of things to nitpick about.
Hey. It was one of your own who tried to dissociate communism from evolutionism altogether. I merely pointed out that historically evolutionism is the world view of choice for communists.
Do you believe there is no historic realtionship whatsoever bvetween evolutionism and communism?
With an attitude like that, I'm sure it's only a matter of time before you're excommunicated yet again. No true Christian would have dared to question the divine right of kings...
I see. You would prefer we confine the discussion to pure theorizing, rather than muddy it up with messy things like examples or tests?
Kindly point out to me how any of this was off the subject of evolutionary theory, the apparent subject of this thread, so that my apology can be appropriately detailed and effulgent.
Darwin and Marx were contemporaries. Along with Abe Lincoln, Thomas Edison, Alexander Graham Bell, Cornelius Vanderbilt, and millions of others. So many people to blame ...
Lo and behold, it was Marx who imbibed the teachings of Darwin and applied them with vigor to the detriment of untold millions. Not Lincoln. Not Bell. Not Vanderbilt. Not millions of others.
Historically, theism has been the world view of choice for monarchs. You must be a royalist, right?
Do you believe there is no historic realtionship whatsoever bvetween evolutionism and communism?
Only as a matter of convenience. Socialism requires the destruction of all other organizations in civil society. State-sponsored atheism via (in part) evolutionary theory was simply a tool used by communists to cement their power and eliminate churches as competitors for the hearts and minds of the masses. If Lenin thought he could sell communism as a revelation from God, and thereby co-opt religion, I have little doubt he would have done so, and we would now be discussing the divine right of the Bolshevik party, rather than their preference for athiesm.
And, of course, they were simply wrong about any supposed link between atheism and evolution, as they were wrong about so many other things. The truth of evolution does not imply the falsity of God, regardless of whether they believed so or not.
Only an evolutionist would draw that kind of conclusion.
"Only as a matter of convenience."
Evolutionism is certainly a convenient way of disposing with truth.
Wrong again. I am merely a left wing fringe idealist liberal thought evolutionist/atheist/activist/enlisted man, not an officer.
Really? My logic is identical to yours. If evolution is deficient because it has been adopted by communists, then clearly theism is equally deficient because it has been adopted by monarchs. If you don't like my argument, you shouldn't be making it.
Evolutionism is certainly a convenient way of disposing with truth.
I will simply take the lack of a substantive response to mean that you find nothing of substance to object to in my post.
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