Darwinists Eager to Avoid Debate

Last year, in public comments before the Cobb County Board of Education, I witnessed firsthand the danger that can come when personal opinions and philosophical or religious prejudices are allowed into the science classroom.

I was shocked as Cobb County public school teachers stood at the podium and made the absurd claim that evolution is an absolute proven fact that is no longer disputed by reasonable, educated people.

Further, these teachers went on to denigrate anyone who held an opposing viewpoint as “uneducated,” “illogical,” “radical” and my all time favorite, “right-wing extremists.”

I left that meeting vowing to protect my children from the obvious bias and open hostility that was exhibited by the teachers in attendance.

Now that Georgia school Superintendent Kathy Cox has proposed new science standards that de-emphasize the terminology used to explain evolution, the state teachers and professors are once again in an uproar, claiming that our students will receive a substandard education unless they are taught all of the facts concerning the origin of life.

I could not agree more. The answer is not to de-emphasize or water down the classroom instruction on this fascinating and important topic, but to examine it openly, critically and fully.

Students should be exposed to all of the scientific evidence on evolution, both for and against, so that they can come to logical, informed, scientific conclusions. However, in their clamor for “all the facts” to be taught, there are a few facts that the pro-evolution science educators are keeping from our students.

• Far from settled science, there is a growing debate within the science community about the ability of evolution to fully explain the diversity of life on Earth. More than 300 scientists from major universities nationwide, including dozens from Georgia, have signed a document expressing doubts about the claims of evolution.
• Modern science instruction includes an undisclosed bias that artificially eliminates any possibilities other than evolution to explain life. It prevents the students from expanding their scientific knowledge and learning skills by forbidding the opportunity to investigate alternative theories scientifically.
• Much of the “evidence” cited in science textbooks in support of evolution is dubious at best, and in many cases outright fraudulent. Biologist Jonathan Wells, in the “Icons of Evolution,” discloses countless examples of textbook evolutionary “evidence” that has been summarily dismissed by mainstream science, yet is still in use today.
• Scientific evidence that might cast doubt about the claims of Darwinian evolution has been censored from Georgia classrooms, as are the views of scientists who dissent from the established evolutionary doctrine.
• In an attempt to cloud the issue, the Darwinists will always try to interject “creationism” and “separation of church and state” into the debate. Knowing that they cannot win the debate on the merits of the evidence, they will always resort to this tactic.

The Darwinists are always quick to label someone like me a religious extremist who just wants to interject my own personal faith into the science classroom. Yet it is they who seek, through the power of the state, to insulate their own beliefs about life’s origins from critical examination, to propagate those beliefs on an unwitting student population, and who defend their beliefs with the fervency of the most radical fundamentalist.

Georgians should ask themselves why they are so adamantly opposed to an honest, open and critical examination of evolutionary theory in our classrooms. Could it be that their sacred cow is less than convincing when exposed to the light of truth?

Larry Taylor, father of three children in Cobb County public schools, is director of Parents for Truth in Education.