Posted on 09/28/2005 4:11:22 AM PDT by PatrickHenry
HARRISBURG, Pa. - A former physics teacher testified that his rural school board ignored faculty protests before deciding to introduce the theory of "intelligent design" to high school students.
"I saw a district in which teachers were not respected for their professional expertise," Bryan Rehm, a former teacher at Dover High School, said Tuesday.
Rehm, who now teaches in another district, is a plaintiff in the nation's first trial over whether public schools can teach "intelligent design."
Eight Dover families are trying to have the controversial theory removed from the curriculum, arguing that it violates the constitutional separation of church and state. They say it effectively promotes the Bible's view of creation.
Proponents of intelligent design argue that life on Earth was the product of an unidentified intelligent force, and that Charles Darwin's theory of natural selection cannot fully explain the origin of life or the emergence of highly complex life forms.
Aralene "Barrie" Callahan, a former member of the Dover school board and another plaintiff in the case, said that at least two board members made statements during meetings that made her believe the new policy was religiously based.
At a retreat in March 2003, a board member "expressed he did not believe in evolution and if evolution was part of the biology curriculum, creationism had to be shared 50-50," Callahan testified.
At a school board meeting in June 2004, when she was no longer on the board, Callahan recalled another board member complaining that a biology book recommended by the administration was "laced with Darwinism."
"They were pretty much downplaying evolution as something that was credible," she said.
In October 2004, the board voted 6-3 to require teachers to read a brief statement about intelligent design to students before classes on evolution. The statement says Darwin's theory is "not a fact" and has inexplicable "gaps," and refers students to an intelligent-design textbook for more information.
In a separate development Tuesday, two freelance newspaper reporters who covered the school board in June 2004 both invoked their First Amendment rights and declined to provide a deposition to lawyers for the school district.
Both are expected in court Wednesday to respond to a subpoena to testify at trial, said Niles Benn, a lawyer for the papers. Lawyers for the school district have questioned the accuracy of articles in which the reporters wrote that board members discussed creationism during public meetings.
In other testimony Tuesday, plaintiff Tammy Kitzmiller said that in January, her younger daughter opted out of hearing the statement - an option given all students - putting her in an awkward position.
"My 14-year-old daughter had to make the choice between staying in the classroom and being confused ... or she had to be singled out and face the possible ridicule of her friends and classmates," she said.
The Dover Area School District, which serves about 3,500 students, is believed to be the nation's first school system to mandate that students be exposed to the intelligent design concept. It argues it is not endorsing any religious view and only letting students know there are differences of opinion about evolution.
The non-jury trial is expected to take five weeks.
Why is it that whenever creationists want to slander evolution, they call it "religion?"
While I often detest their politics, nobody should kid themselves the ACLU don't have a great bunch of lawyers.
Whatever happened to SeaLion?
Yeah, that's one of the things bothering me about this case too. If the Thomas More folks were looking for a test case, this one sure wasn't it. The Dover Board's actions only have to fail a single prong of the Lemon test, and it's obvious that they're going to fail 1 and 2, with a healthy suggestion that they'll fail prong 3 as well.
You know what I really don't understand though? Why on earth any religious person would want to place religious doctrine in the government arena to begin with. I really, really don't get that at all. I mean, just picture this scenario....they win, and suddenly ID and then creationism become part of public school curriculum. Suddenly, you have government actors deciding the proper way to teach religious doctrine. Do the creationist advocates really think this is a good idea? Our schools can barely teach English properly, and these folks want them to teach their children proper religious doctrine?
Evolution is a "theory" about how species evolve. But Evolution also does occur, and thus it is a "fact" as well.
Like gravity, which is a scientific "theory", but things do indeed fall when we drop them, making gravity a "fact".
Nuclear "theory" can also be observed when fission reactors operate, making it a "fact".
Music "theory" taught in most colleges can be observed as a "fact" by turning on the radio.
Well then "your God" is a liar because He left enormous evidence in many different scientific disciplines that contradict a literal 6 day creation.
Either that or the Catholics are right in their interpretation of Genesis and you're wrong.
I rather doubt anyone will appeal. The case will be decided on facts, and I don't think anyone in the ID movement wants this set as a new and binding precident.
DI has good lawyers too, which is why they stayed out.
Dunno. Some creo type didn't like him and hit the abuse button.
Ignorance must really be bliss. I guess it is better to be ignorant and 'saved' than educated about how things really are and 'damned.'
Let's see...PH posted those links at 6:15...you started posting on this thread slightly under an hour later. We're all to understand that you read and comprehended that entire body of material, including the additional links in Ichneumon's post, in under an hour, and came to the above brilliant conclusion. Uh huh.
That's because the basic premise of ID is not scientifically testable. It's not science and should not be taught as such.
I think you've pretty much hit the nail on the head with regard to ID/creationist motivations....
You bring up a good point. Many Christians see this as the beach head needed to take back schools from a secular educational cirriculum. They don't see your logic in that if the schools mess up regular subjects, how badly will they mess up the religious concepts they want to introduce?
After quite a bit of time on creationist threads, I've concluded that many creationists don't think.
Our schools can barely teach English properly, and these folks want them to teach their children proper religious doctrine?
Which demonstrates my point about creationists not thinking. Not only would the public schools teach religious doctrine badly, but Christians would never agree on what the proper religious doctrine to teach. Since there are probably 1000+ Christian denominations, many which disagree vehemently on doctrine, it would be impossible for public schools to teach religion without some other Christian objecting.
Tyranny is always appealing to those who would be tryants.
Precisely! Proper religious doctrine is just about the one thing you can count on "true believers" to disagree about to the point of violence. Well, with the possible exception of Zen Buddhists.
The true believers that I have encountered on this site alone are vehemently opposed to government interference in almost all aspects of their lives. How can they not see this as the ultimate in government interference? How can they not see the government taking absolute advantage of the opportunity to teach "proper" doctrine? To me, this is the primary purpose of the protection of the First Amendment. Keeping religion separated from government isn't just about protecting the non-religious from religion. It is primarily and originally about protecting religion from government. Putting religion back into the schools would be the first step in government taking over religion, IMO.
But more to the point of your witty post, none of those situations you mention are not trying to wedge their way into science through deceit. They are at least honest about what they say.
Do you even know the history of the Book of Genesis that you are putting so much faith into? Not the history in it, but the history of where it came from and how it got included in the bible.
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