Whats at stake in the battle over evolution

POLITICIANS IN 19 states are trying to force biology teachers to sow
doubts about the theory of evolution. Doubts are all they can manage
for now, since the alternative view--“creation science,” which has
also been repackaged as something called “intelligent design
theory”--finds little support among people who actually study living
things.


Virtually all biologists believe that material processes, not divine
intervention, account for the origin of life from inanimate
matter--and for the adaptive “fit” between organisms and their
environments. As a result, courts have ruled since 1968 that mandating
creation “science” in public schools is an unlawful imposition of a
religious view.


Faced with these setbacks, creationists now propose teaching the
“controversy” over evolution as a matter of free speech. This new
strategy resembles the tobacco companies’ four-decade attempt to
convince people that there was a “controversy” over the connection
between smoking and disease.


As with the corporate-sponsored tobacco “researchers,” creationists
have a hidden motive for pushing discredited ideas. The companies were
after profits--and the creationists are pushing a conservative social
agenda.
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Socialist Worker