Posted on 02/02/2011 1:13:00 PM PST by wmfights
A retired science teacher believes the teaching of evolution is "bad science" and has asked a federal court to declare it illegal to teach the subject in public schools.
Tom Ritter, a former physics and chemistry teacher of over 10 years, filed a lawsuit earlier this month against evolution in the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Pennsylvania, the same court that ruled that teaching of intelligent design in public schools is unconstitutional.
Ritter told The Christian Post this week that he didn't pay too much attention to biology before, but now in retirement he saw problems that he couldn't overlook any longer.
"It kind of got to be like picking a scab," he said.
In his one-page brief and one-page suit, Ritter argues that the Blue Mountain School District in Orwigsburg, Penn., is an illegal body because it teaches evolution.
A local resident, Ritter wants the district to stop collecting taxes from him until such teaching is halted. This is one scheme in his plan to get rid of public schools altogether, which he considers to be a waste of taxpayer dollars.
Order Online: Darwin on Trial
The suit contends that the 2005 Kitzmiller v. Dover decision forbids any teaching of evolution that includes a creator. It also argues that evolution is unscientific.
According to Ritter, evolution is unscientific for three reasons: no one has demonstrated that life can be created from non-life; no one has demonstrated that a new "sexual species" can be created; and no one has demonstrated how the human brain evolved from lower forms.
Since evolution is unscientific and teaches the absence of a creator, it is actually teaching atheism, the suit contends. Therefore, teaching evolution should be illegal in public schools because it is a religion.
"Objectively, Atheism is a religion, albeit a silly and unscientific one," the Jan. 18 suit states. "This is like teaching Jesus is Lord."
While Ritter said his court filings are really made for "popular consumption," he does expect to have his day in court.
"I think it will be taken seriously aside from the fact that I know some science," he said.
Since evolution is unscientific and teaches the absence of a creator, it is actually teaching atheism, the suit contends. Therefore, teaching evolution should be illegal in public schools because it is a religion.
I thought you might find his argument interesting. I'll try to keep you posted as the case progresses.
He’s absolutely right. Problem is, when it comes to evolutionism, the lefties forget about “separation of church and state.”
I’m sure this will get far.....
“A local resident, Ritter wants the district to stop collecting taxes from him until such teaching is halted.”
He wasted a lot of talent teaching and instead should be writing comedy.
I think so to!
Problem is, when it comes to evolutionism, the lefties forget about “separation of church and state.”
I agree, but it's good to take the fight to them. :-)
Here we go...
But now he's injected an implicitly theistic criteria into it by making the teaching of evolution tantamount to teaching atheism. This amounts to an making an offical state declaration that theistic evolution is not a legitimate religious belief.
He is right. In that evolution teaches ultimate things, such as origins, and suggests doctrinal things, such as relative meanings, it is a religion.
The fact that it undergirds itself with circumstantial evidence also is no different than other religions.
Thanks for the ping!
I’d settle for separation of school and state.
Awfully ignorant for a science teacher not to know that.
The case should be immediately thrown out and this retired teacher should be ordered to pay all court costs.
The theory of evolution makes no claims as the origin of life, and if the guy knew his ass from a hole in the ground, he'd know that.
What an idiot.
If by origins you mean more complex life descending from simpler life, then you would be right. But in a lot of cases even pseudoscientists who preach intelligent design recognize common descent (Behe for example)
But if you're implying that evolution makes determinations about how life started from non-life, then you'd be incorrect.
the primordial soup was taught to me. I remember it. I’ve documented it.
So, who taught you, and where is the documentation? You must have learned the chemical and electrical circumstances that sprang life. Please share.
I’ve posted the titles of textbooks from my era of high school, and I don’t think it will accomplish anything to do so again.
You can look it up. Find old 60’s and 70’s biology texts and it’ll be there. I don’t have the time to do it for you today.
The primordial soup....I was taught it just as surely as I was taught diagramming sentences in English grammar.
Darwin never officially touched the subject of abiogenesis in his theory. Indeed, he never asked or answered the question "what is life?" - a question which seems to interest the mathematicians and physicists more than the biologists.
He did however speak of a warm little pond in his personal correspondence.
I suspect the Miller/Urey experiments of the 1950's caused some teachers and textbook writers to think that abiogenesis was a "given." However, the Miller/Urey experiments went no further than amino acids. Then again, they did not have the insight of Information Theory. Indeed, Crick and Watson (late 50's) did not have the insight either.
At any rate, it appears the educators have now become cautious on the subject.
I suspect that dropping the primordial soup discussion out of “pure evolution” was more about the difficulties it caused debate than anything else. Nor was it about too much garlic, without which no soup is every truly complete. :>)
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