The Glorious Atomicflea wrote:
It says they aren't going to teach it. It's a brief statement that says that Darwin's theories are not fact, and that other views exist such as ones expressed in this book, etc. I still fail to see where it 'legitimizes' religion. What does that mean? That you should refuse to acknowledge that other explanations exist?
It may not "legitimize" religion, but it does go out of its way to interrupt the flow of education in a SCIENCE class just to make sure that a non-scientific theory, a theory that not only is non-scientific, but also promotes religious doctrine, gets a nod.
Children can learn about creationism in the home, or in Sunday school, or any number of other places where such information is entirely appropriate, so we have to ask ourselves, why is it so important to the ID people that ID be acknowledged as the opening sequence in a science class? What purpose can it serve, other than to try to lend scientific validity to the theory.
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The letter also states that students may be excused while it is read, if the parent would like them to be. It seems that this is simply acknowledging the other side of the coin.
But it's not the appropriate place. Science isn't just a collection of answers, it's a mode of inquiry. The theory of evolution is a theory that--right or wrong--was arrived at by scientific inquiry. If there were competing SCIENTIFIC theories (and there are, depending on how deep into astrophysics you want to go) on how the universe/earth/man evolved, then those should, quite appropriately, be presented in a scientific forum. But ID is a theory that owes nothing to scientific inquiry and everything to personal faith, and therefore, it has no place in a class where scientific inquiry is being taught.
Parents shouldn't HAVE to take their kids out of a class, however temporarily, so that they won't be taught something that the class isn't about in the first place. The class is about science.
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Even if you don't believe in intelligent design, isn't it only scholarly and scientific to acknowledge other theories even if you are only doing so to debunk them?
If those other theories are scientific in nature, then yes, of course. But you can't "debunk" an article of faith. ID is not based upon scientific inquiry, therefore it has no place being acknowledged, whether for the purpose of promotion or negation, in a class that is supposed to be about science.