Dance Dance Evolution!

A federal judge in Pennsylvania ruled yesterday that intelligent design could not be taught in a Pennsylvania public school district. Read bout it here or here.

I believe that we were all created by intelligent design, but not everyone sees it that way. That's OK. But this issue is irritating, because no one will ever see eye-to-eye on this. It has become a bigger issue than it should be.

What I hate most about this issue is how this thing has turned into a separation of church versus state thing. That's not really what it should be about. Here's why: When people talk about the separation of church and state, they refer to the first amendment of the Bill of Rights. The first amendment states, and I quote:

"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances."

I may be wrong, but according to the first amendment, it says that congress cannot establish a state sanctioned religion and then make everyone follow it.

The theory of evolution versus intelligent design argument should not be a separation of church versus state issue. The real issue here is whether or not God is appropriate for science class.

Because science is a class that is fact based, intelligent design cannot be taught. Intelligent design relies on faith based text to present evidence of a supreme being. As most people never claim to have seen God (or any other supreme being for that matter) and it cannot be proven with solid evidence that He exists, intelligent design cannot be taught as fact. Therefore, intelligent design is not appropriate for the science classroom.

On the same token, Darwin's theory of evolution has not been proven as fact either. Hence the fact that it is still a theory. The problem we find with the theory of evolution is that many scientists accept it as the gospel truth and refuse to believe that the human race came anywhere else besides from apes. However, the theory of evolution as Charles Dawrin saw it has yet to be proven as fact, so it should not be taught in a general science class either.

After much debate, Henry and I decided that instead of eliminating intelligent design and evolution from schools completely, a new class should be established: an optional scientific theory class. That way, all scientific theories could be taught in one class for all to hear if they wanted. It wouldn't be a mandated course, so those who refuse to believe in either intelligent design or evolution (or both) wouldn't have to participate, thus eliminating most controversy surrounding those theories (or facts, depending on which way you swing).

Problem solved.