Orange County Ruling: An Attack on Teaching Evolution

[redwinter]

http://www.revcom.us/a/169/Attack_on_Evolution-en.html

Orange County Ruling: An Attack on Teaching Evolution

From a reader

A US District Court judge in California issued a dangerous ruling on May 1, 2009, in a civil lawsuit against a California public school history teacher. The teacher, James Corbett, was sued by Christian fundamentalists. Corbett is well known in Capistrano Valley High in Orange County, California, as a teacher who stimulated critical thinking and who at times made pungent critiques of religion, creationism, and traditional morality. The fundamentalist lawsuit cited statements they claimed Corbett made in classrooms, and argued that Corbett was in violation of the separation of church and state.

Continue reading... (http://www.revcom.us/a/169/Attack_on_Evolution-en.html)

[mikelepore]

The article says: "The ruling by Judge James Serna upheld one of their claims—that when Corbett said creationism was 'religious, superstitious nonsense', this violated U.S. Constitutional provisions that say that a teacher as an agent of the state cannot either support or oppose religion."

Most creationists believe the James Ussher proposition that the earth was created in the year 4004 BC. But radiometric dating of some rocks shows that they are over four billion years old. So what the the judge in this case is saying is that, when a bunch of amateurs assert that the rigorous calculations of nuclear physics are wrong, it's forbidden for a teacher to describe their claim as nonsense. This anti-science is a rerun of the Inquisition versus Galileo.

[CommunityBeliever]

This is rubbish. If I ran the universe I would add a half credit in evolution to the graduation requirements and I would shut down any school that disagrees :lol:

[MarxSchmarx]

The article says: "The ruling by Judge James Serna upheld one of their claims—that when Corbett said creationism was 'religious, superstitious nonsense', this violated U.S. Constitutional provisions that say that a teacher as an agent of the state cannot either support or oppose religion."Lemme play the lawyer - the problem wasn't so much that the teacher denounced creationism as "nonsense", but he denounced it as "religious...nonsense", implicitly suggestion that all religious ideas are inherently nonsensical.

Of course I think that is dead on, but one can make the argument that that amounts to a blanket denunciation of religion as such as "nonsense" and is, as uttered by a representative of the state in their capacity as such, arguably against the separation of Church and state.

Of course I agree 100% with this teacher I wish he'd gone further, but to play the devil's advocate the other side does appear to have a fair case under modern constitutions.



Most creationists believe the James Ussher proposition that the earth was created in the year 4004 BC. But radiometric dating of some rocks shows that they are over four billion years old. So what the the judge in this case is saying is that, when a bunch of amateurs assert that the rigorous calculations of nuclear physics are wrong, it's forbidden for a teacher to describe their claim as nonsense.

I think your point is basically correct, but at the same time if I founded a "religion of wosapsdofj" that explicitly held the belief that modern nuclear physics was wrong, why would a government employee denouncing wosapsdofj as wrong be any more legitimate than a government employee denouncing, say, the Christian Scientist belief in prayer as a legitimate medical treatment or Buddhist meditation as a legitimate form of psychotherapy, or the Catholic procedures for baptism as ineffective? The point is there is a slippery slope under bourgeois legal theory that snares such legitimate concerns.

[mikelepore]

Suppose a public school teacher were to say that an ancient Greek belief, for example, that you can get a more effective wind for your sailboat by performing an animal sacrifice, is "religious, superstitious nonsense." I don't think the court would have ruled in this way. The supposed freedom of religion in the U.S. has always been based on the premise that there are certain valid religions. To get the protection you have to be in one of the officially recognized religions. Belief in the Bible is one of the recognized ones.

[Klaatu]

Therein lies the problem in America (and more so in other countries) that belief and faith somehow over rule scientific thought, common sense, and tangible empirical evidence of the natural world.

This goes beyond religion. It spills into political thought too. For example, the American conservative belief that tax-cutting somehow leads to higher government revenues. Their belief is that, by cutting taxes, government "puts more money in the hands of the consumer" (the mantra of right wing hacks here) and by so doing, grows the economy. But what of the resulting shortfall of public spending funding? The solution is to "borrow," which leads to public debt, which causes interest rates to rise, which in turn hurts economic growth. In other words, a viscous cycle of confusion.

This is complete rubbish. It's as if I asked my employer to cut my own salary, so that I could afford to buy a new car. Now just how is that supposed to work?

The point is, let us please get away from all of this faith garbage and leave that to the churches. Politics and science and religion are three things which do not mix.

[*Viva La Revolucion*]

In this case I actually think the teacher may have been wrong to call it 'religious nonsense'; not that I'm disagreeing with that statement, I just think he could have dismissed creationism without using that kind of language. It was a science class and so science should be taught, not the teacher's opinions. I do think teachers have a responsibility to remain unbiased on most issues because they should be presenting students with facts and letting them decide for themselves.

Besides, religion and schooling should be kept separate unless students choose to study it as a subject.

[Klaatu]

That's right, religious training and tax-funded public schools should be kept as separate as oil and water.