Ban this book
A Times EditorialA biology textbook that discusses religious beliefs doesn't belong in Florida's high school science classes.
Published January 23, 2006
Maybe Florida's commissioner of education, John Winn, hasn't been paying attention to the battles that have erupted around the country over intelligent design and whether to include a supernatural theory in America's public school biology classes. He should read the opinion issued by the federal judge who recently ruled that the Dover, Pa., school district could not include a short statement on intelligent design in its biology curriculum, since that would be unconstitutionally mixing religion with science.
Winn made a mistake by approving a biology textbook for Florida high school students that discusses religious beliefs under the heading "The Origin of Life." The textbook, Biology: The Dynamics of Life , includes two paragraphs on the belief that life was created by a supreme being. In a section titled "Biology and Society," under the subheading "Divine Origins" it says, "Common to human cultures throughout history is the belief that life on Earth did not arise spontaneously." It goes on to state that followers of many of the world's major religions believe that "life could only have arisen through the direct action of a divine force."
The section continues: "A variation of this belief is that organisms are too complex to have developed only by evolution ... without some guiding intelligence." On the same page, scientific hypotheses - objectively tested and investigated propositions on life's origins - are also discussed. The corresponding teacher's manual suggests that the class engage in a debate on the origins of life, as if all points of view are equally valid for a science class discussion.
There is no debate about the correctness of evolutionary biology within the mainstream scientific community. Encouraging a discussion of religious beliefs in a science class only breeds confusion. Florida's young people get too little scientific training as it is, so why would the state want teachers to spend valuable time exploring the supernatural?
Even the official newspaper of the Vatican has declared the ruling in the Dover case to be correct. If the pope understands what belongs in the realm of faith and what belongs in the realm of science, then maybe Winn and his department should, too. This textbook is available without the religious passages, and that is the only version that should have been approved for Florida's public schools.