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ants together
Strong jaws of red ant close-up
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Against Sociobiology

They believe, or at least for the purposes of doing science they believe, that matter in motion is all that exists, and that mind and consciousness are merely special configurations of that matter. Anyone who believes this must, as a matter of logical necessity, also believe in evolution. Read More ›
Rubber Lizards

Survival of the Fakest

If you had asked me during my years studying science at Berkeley whether or not I believed what I read in my science textbooks, I would have responded much as any of my fellow students: puzzled that such a question would be asked in the first place. One might find tiny errors, of course, typos and misprints. And science is always discovering new things. But I believed — took it as a given — that my science textbooks represented the best scientific knowledge available at that time. Read More ›
We the people - Constitutional document and flag
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Religion and the Constitution

This essay makes three main arguments: (1) By crafting a document that took seriously the fallibility of human nature, America’s Founders created a government that has withstood the political passions that have destroyed so many other regimes throughout human history. (2) By refusing to sanction even the hint of an official state religion in their new Constitution, the Founders encouraged Read More ›

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Brooklyn Bridge
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Evangelical Reform in Early Nineteenth Century America

To American evangelicals, the new century seemed anything but hospitable. Many Americans had stopped going to church. Some openly doubted Christianity, preferring to place their hopes in reason alone rather than a God who intervenes in human affairs. The nation’s cities were turning into havens of crime, promiscuity, and alcoholism. Radical social reformers dotted the landscape, attracting enthusiastic interest, if Read More ›

21st-Century War Economics

“The Republicans don’t have a clue how bad the economy is,” a Democratic congressional aide told us one late October night, savoring the vision of a gavel in Dick Gephardt’s hand. Then, slowly, he broke into a wide smile, like a happy hijacker dreaming of seventy succulent virgin interns awaiting him in paradise. Chiefly in the business of appraising enterprise Read More ›

Let’s change science standards and let students do real science

Should Pennsylvania’s science standards be changed? Draft language for the standards is expected to go before the state legislature early in 2001. According to standards adopted in 1998, students are expected to “know” that “organisms arose from materials and life forms of the past” because of “evidence of evolution in the form of fossils . . . embryological studies and Read More ›

Photo by Felicia Buitenwerf

Evolution Debate: Student Leads Textbook Challenge

PERKASIE, Pennsylvania (CNN) — It’s a debate that just won’t go away. The latest battleground over the teaching of evolution in public schools is in the town of Perkasie, Pennsylvania. But what makes this particular debate unique is that the campaign against teaching evolution is being led not by parents or politicians, but a high school student. Joe Baker, 19, Read More ›

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book lot on black wooden shelf
Photo by Giammarco Boscaro via Unsplash

The Roots and Remedy of Judicial Imperialism

Legal pragmatism traces its origins to the early decades of the twentieth century, when America was wrestling with the implications of Darwin's theory of evolution. Arguably the most significant impact of the Scopes trial was on legal philosophy itself. Read More ›