Category: Free Speech
Evolution Academic Freedom Bill Submitted in South Carolina is Sixth this Year
South Carolina Senator Mike Fair has submitted an Academic Freedom Bill into the South Carolina State Legislature. This is now the sixth academic freedom bill submitted this legislative session, as other bills have been submitted in Florida, Missouri, Michigan, Alabama, and Louisiana. The text of Senator Fair’s bill would require that, “The State Board of Education, superintendents of public school districts, and public school administrators may not prohibit a teacher in a public school of this State from helping his students understand, analyze, critique, and review the scientific strengths and weaknesses of biological and chemical evolution in an objective manner.” Meanwhile, like other commentators, the National Center for Science Education (NCSE) cannot admit that South Carolina’s state science standards require Read More ›
Criticism of evolution not safe for discussion in Florida schools
The Florida state legislature’s inability to push through an academic freedom bill highlights the difficulty of passing any legislation, expecially one that has strong opposition. Any legislation dealing with the teaching of evolution is bound to face an uphill battle as Darwinists are effective at organizing groups and people to pressure the legislators. Where does that leave the teachers in Florida?
Could Science and the Chronicle of Higher Education Be Any More Biased — or Wrong?
The documentary Expelled keenly observes that scientific ideas begin in the academy, but if they’re to get out to the people, they must pass through a series of barriers and “checkpoints,” which means they can be hindered or stopped at any point along the way. In the film, the first checkpoint is the academy, which polices journals and controls research grants and funding. The second checkpoint is comprised of watchdog groups, like the NCSE, that work hard to organize and kindle opposition against Darwin-skeptics. The next checkpoint is the media, which carefully selects the sources of information it will broadcast to the public on this issue. When all those checkpoints fail, the final checkpoint is the courts. (This idea is Read More ›
Ronald Bailey Attacks Expelled, Endorses Discrimination Against Intelligent Design Proponents
[Note: For a more comprehensive defense of Ben Stein’s documentary Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed, please see: NCSE Exposed at NCSEExposed.org] Over at Reason.com, Ronald Bailey has taken the Michael Shermer (i.e., Fact Free) approach to attacking Expelled. Bailey charges that “the film is entirely free of scientific content–no scientific evidence against biological evolution and none for ‘intelligent design’ (ID) theory is given.” But last time I saw the film, it featured well-credentialed scientists arguing that natural selection lacks information-generative power and arguing the digitally-encoded information in DNA and highly efficient micromachines and factories in the cell strongly indicate an intelligent cause. Bailey makes the simplistic (and inadequate) argument for neo-Darwinism based upon the fact that the fossil record shows that species Read More ›
Florida House Republicans Kill Evolution Academic Freedom Measure
Well, it’s official. The Florida House of Representatives refused today to pass the academic freedom measure on evolution previously passed by the state Senate, and so the measure is now dead because the legislative session has ended. Supposedly, the Florida House refused to pass the Senate bill because it favored a stronger measure to require the critical analysis of evolution. As a former political science professor, I can tell you that this explanation doesn’t hold water. If the Republican House leadership in Florida really supported academic freedom on evolution, they would have passed the Senate bill. Instead, they shamefully passed a bill earlier this week with language that the Senate had previously rejected, knowing full well this would likely mean Read More ›