Blowing in the wind

In the latest skirmish between students and administration concerning religious content at graduation ceremonies, a graduate of a Seattle high school is suing the Everett School District for refusing to allow her and the other members of the school’s wind ensemble to play “Ave Maria” at graduation. Traditionally permitted to select one piece of music to play at the ceremony, the ensemble unanimously chose an instrumental version of “Ave Maria,” but their selection was vetoed by district superintendent Carol Whitehead because, according to the suit, Whitehead believed the piece was too religious.

This occurrence is absurd though not surprising. Public schools have come to the point where they are assuming that anything that is remotely religious may not be presented at school-sponsored events—even instrumental versions of religious songs. However, what interests me more in this case is the fact that Charles Haynes, lead expert at The First Amendment Center, was quoted in the story as saying that, “We’re in a culture war, and anything to do with religion in schools is scary for administrators.”

Haynes is a typical “expert” on First Amendment issues whom the press goes to for predictable quotes whenever a new case arises. He essentially spouts what the United States Supreme Court says the Amendment means and always errs on the side of curtailing religious expression in the public square. Thus, I almost never agree with his assessments, but it is interesting that even such a conventional First Amendment lawyer as Charles Haynes admits that the country is engaged in a culture war.

That phrase is usually only employed by conservative zealots like Pat Buchanan and Pat Robertson. Liberals avoid it like the plague because (a) they do not want to publicize their agenda to change the culture and (b) they do not believe there is such a thing as a culture: instead, they hold to the idea that as long as culture is changing it is evolving for the better. A “culture war” implies that there are two diametrically opposed philosophies of the social condition that are waging a battle for supremacy in our country. Whoever prevails determines the fate of the nation.

These occurrences at graduation ceremonies act as barometers of the larger war, indicating that there is an elite—represented in schools by the administration—that wants to inoculate the culture from any religious influence, and there is a rank and file—represented by the students—that wants to express the importance of the role that religion plays in their lives. The elite have power and the rank and file have numbers. The elite suppress expression through power and judicial decrees while the rank and file pipe up through occasional protest behavior. Obviously, to win the culture war the protests have to become more than occasional. Whether that will happen is anybody’s guess.

 

Cutting commencement

Proving once again that the ACLU only cares about free speech of the non-Christian variety, the liberal legal advocacy group is defending a Las Vegas school district that impeded a high school valedictorian’s commencement speech because it supposedly contained content that was too religious. Officials of the Clark County School District had edited an early draft of Brittany McComb’s commencement speech by cutting references to God, the Bible, and the crucifixion of Christ. When McComb started to give the unedited version of her speech to her fellow graduates and their families, school officials cut her microphone, claiming that the speech would have amounted to school proselytizing on behalf of Christianity.

This is classic hypocrisy from the ACLU. It waves the banner of free speech for even the vilest purveyors of smut, but when a high schooler wants to talk about how God has impacted her life in her valedictory speech the outfit jumps to the defense of the censoring school district. The district appears to be contradicting its own policy on these matters by interfering with McComb’s speech because the policy states that speakers “chosen on the basis of genuinely neutral, evenhanded criteria” are responsible for the content of their expression and “it may not be restricted because of its religious (or anti-religious) content.” McComb was chosen in about the most neutral way possible—earning the title of valedictorian—and therefore her speech should not have been censored, let alone ruined by being cut off in the process of delivery.

The school district’s excuse that they had to shut McComb up because the speech would have been perceived as the school proselytizing about Christianity is complete nonsense because, as McComb herself observed, “People aren’t stupid and they know we have freedom of speech and the district wasn’t advocating my ideas. Those are my opinions. It’s what I believe.” It is sad when a high school senior has more common sense and understands the law better than the school district that taught her or the vaunted ACLU. I hope students continue to protest the asinine curbing of religious expression at commencement ceremonies. Eventually schools will have to rethink their behavior.

 

Byrd’s wing and a prayer

Sounding a lot like conservative evangelical preacher, West Virginia’s stalwart Democrat Senator Robert Byrd has proposed for the eighth time in his long career a constitutional amendment to allow voluntary prayer in public schools. In a wide-ranging speech introducing the proposal, Byrd expressed that he “do[es] not agree with many of the decisions that have come from the courts concerning prayer in school or prohibiting the display of religious items in public places. I believe that, in ruling after ruling, U.S. courts led by the Supreme Court have been moving closer and closer to prohibiting the free exercise of religion in America. It chills my soul.”

Sometimes things occur that make you feel as if you have stepped into The Twilight Zone. Robert Byrd introducing a constitutional amendment on prayer and giving a speech like this is one of those occasions. Byrd is the best argument for term limits in existence given that he has been in the Senate forever, he is the king of pork in a body that hands out money like its free, and he will ramble on and on incoherently on the Senate floor about the most irrelevant subjects. But sometimes you have to tip your cap even to someone who is so steadfastly on the other side of so many issues. This is one of those times.

Among the other highlights in Byrd’s speech, he offers a poignant ode to the power of prayer: “We know that while our way may not always be God’s way, His way is the only way. Therefore, our way must be His way. We know that life’s most bitter travails can, at times, sear the human soul, painfully driving good people to their knees — sometimes through no fault of their own. But we also know that, so long as there is life, there is hope. And that hardship can be endured and, in fact, diminished through the power of prayer.”

He derides the idea that prayer should not be allowed because it offends some people. “Yet, in America, prayer is increasingly estranged from public life. Some are hesitant to pray for fear they might 'offend' someone. How ridiculous. To think that prayer can be offensive. Offensive to whom? Non-believers? They need only close their ears. How sad, really, that we cannot share our faith, particularly in an effort to comfort others, without being accused of offending someone or, worse, violating the First Amendment.” One would think that is Justice Scalia talking, not one of the most liberal senators in America.

He lauds the religious beliefs of the Founders: “I think we should not forget the mindset of those who established our democracy. They were not afraid of prayer. They believed in a Supreme Being. And they were proud of their faith. They proclaimed it from the rooftops; they did not hang their heads in shame.”

He speaks in favor of “vivid religious images” that the “Founders did not view . . . as repugnant religiosity, something to be kept under wraps for fear of offending the popular culture. They were creating the culture.”

He upbraids the United States Supreme Court for a skewed focus: “I believe that members of the Supreme Court have placed exaggerated emphasis on the Framers’ alleged intent to erect an absolute 'wall of separation' between Church and State. I do not share that view.”

And he leaves no doubt that he does not approve of the current negative treatment of religion in the public square. “I believe that this ingrained predisposition against expressions of religious or spiritual beliefs is wrongheaded, destructive, and completely contrary to the intent of the illustrious Founders of this great nation. Instead of ensuring freedom of religion in a nation founded in part to guarantee that basic liberty, a suffocation, or strangulation, if you might of that freedom has been the result. The rights of those who do not believe—and they are few in number—the rights of those who do not believe in a Supreme Being have been zealously guarded to the denigration—and I repeat, denigration—of the rights of those who do so believe.”

Alas, as good and true as all of these statements are, Byrd does not get everything right in this speech. It is seemingly innocuous and obvious to observe that “[t]his principle makes a lot of sense to me, namely that government itself should seek neither to discourage nor to promote religion.” Government neutrality concerning religion would be fine save for two problems: (1) Neutrality is not possible; and (2) neutrality was not intended by the Founders.

Concerning the first point, it is not possible for the government simply to play umpire with regard to religion. Too often neutrality ends up resulting in hostility because not favoring religion at all by default favors atheism. The reason for this is simple: either there is a God or there is not; either the supernatural exists or it does not. There is no neutral position on this question. Consequently, the government takes a position whether deliberately or by default, so a determination has to be made as to which position is the better one to take. The fact that religion is a part of so many people’s lives and that it serves as a check on government power are just two of the reasons why government policy erring on the side of supporting religion is a good idea.

The second point—that neutrality was not intended by the Founders—could be proven many times over with historical anecdotes and quotes from the Founders, but it will have to suffice here to observe that the Declaration of Independence, the document which proclaimed the country’s reason for being, insisted that we are all “endowed by [our] Creator with certain unalienable rights” and that government should not violate these sacred rights. Our whole theory of government assumes the existence and importance of God to our lives as individuals and as a nation. Moreover, concerning the Constitution, founding patriot and second President of the United States John Adams once observed: “[W]e have no government armed with power capable of contending with human passions unbridled by morality and religion. . . . Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate for the government of any other.” Thus, our system will not even work properly if the government insists on trying to achieve this mythical neutrality concerning religion.

It is better to emphasize, as do the words of the First Amendment, that government will not establish one religion or denomination as the official one in this country or blatantly favor one religion or denomination over all others. But to have a bias toward religion in general is to foster a climate more conducive to morality, generosity, and peacefulness. That is what a policy of encouraging prayer in schools is about. Such a policy is not neutral toward religion, but it is proper with regard to the Constitution. Byrd is to be commended for reminding us of that.

 

An Un-Wise move

In a Cincinnati Enquirer column, Ohio State Board of Education member Martha Wise, a self-described conservative Republican, offers her rationalization for why she and other board members reversed course and removed from Ohio’s education standards the recommendation that students use “critical analysis�? in evaluating the theory of evolution. Sounding like a politician running for office (she is a candidate for Ohio Senate), Wise claims that the board “chose to stand up for kids, for the state of Ohio, for freedom of religion, and for the integrity of science�? by refusing to allow any questioning of evolution in the classroom.

A communications specialist for a communist country would be hard-pressed to fill a piece with more propaganda than Wise does here. She starts on the offensive by claiming that she believes in God, freedom, creationism, fiscal conservatism, fairness, and apple pie (okay, I made the last one up). The conclusion that readers presumably are supposed to draw is that Wise is a true-blue conservative (something that is important to emphasize in Republican dominated Ohio), but that the recommendation in the Ohio education standards was so extreme that she could not go along with it. The reality is quite different.

Wise wears the tag of Republican, but comes from the “Democrat-lite�? wing of the party, as she has been an education board member from the Cleveland area for 28 years. One does not stay in political office in Cleveland by sticking to a conservative platform. Note that Wise hints at her true beliefs when she states that she believes in “fiscal conservatism�?; only the liberal wing of the party emphasizes the distinction between fiscal and cultural conservatism, and “fiscal conservatism�? to her probably means nothing more than keeping a balanced budget, not tax cuts and deregulation. Wise is not some fence-rider on the creation/evolution issue either: she has been fighting against the current “critical analysis�? science standards for four years, and won her first victory only last week. Her nods to “fairness and honesty�? are also not believable. How is it unfair to recommend that students critically analyze the theory of evolution, and how is it dishonest to admit that there are gaps in evolution theory?

However, Wise’s most misleading statement at the beginning of her screed is her claim that she believes in creationism and, what’s more, that belief is “what made [her] want to remove ‘critical analysis’/‘intelligent design’ creationism from the [education] standards.�? First note how in one sentence she has lumped creationism, intelligent design, and critical analysis all in the same boat, declining to make any distinction between them. She continues this sleight-of-hand throughout the rest of the article. It is a tactic repeatedly used by the ACLU in fighting against challenges to evolution in the classroom: make fun of creationism and then associate anything that questions evolution with creationism. It is called “moving back the goal posts�? after each successive victory. At first the ACLU simply said it did not want creationism taught in science classrooms. Once it got that wish, it argued that intelligent design does not belong is those same classrooms because it is “creationism-lite.�? After it won a victory on that point in Dover, Pa., the liberal legal self-interest group contended that even saying that students should “critically analyze�? evolution is akin to creationism. Wise adopts the ACLU line lock, stock, and barrel, but we are supposed to believe she is a conservative. Right.

Second, Wise’s statement simply does not pass the laugh test of believability. She tries to claim with a straight face that she believes in creationism—by which we will assume she means that she believes God created the earth and life on it—and yet she does not want it taught in science classrooms. This is not intellectually coherent. If you really believe that God created the world and life on earth, why in the world would you object to that being taught in science class, the very place students study the physical world and life contained on it? Even more, why would you oppose the idea of students learning about weaknesses in evolution considering that the theory of evolution directly contradicts the theory of creation? It strains credulity further still to contend that believing in creationism requires that weaknesses in evolution not be taught in science classrooms. If this is true, why is she the first “creationist�? I have ever heard make such a claim?

The answer to all of these questions is blatantly obvious: Wise is lying. She does not believe in creationism at all. In fact, she is a die-hard evolutionist because only they are so strident about insisting that evolution alone should be taught and further it should be taught without any questioning of the theory whatsoever. The only alternative is that she is stupid because she does not understand even the most rudimentary definition of the term “creationism�? and what it entails. I admit it is tempting to accept this alternative explanation, but it is always better not to underestimate one’s adversaries.

So, within the first three sentences of her column, Wise has established herself as either ignorant or a liar. Either way, there would seem to be no reason to read the rest of her piece, but clinging to a slim hope that she might say something of value, we trudge on.

Wise next states that the reason being a creationist has led her to vote to remove the “critical analysis�? recommendation from Ohio’s science education standards is that “[i]t is deeply unfair to the children of [Ohio] to mislead them about the nature of science.�? Apparently the “nature of science�? is evolution, and it is oh-so important because “[t]he future of Ohio’s prosperity depends on a well-educated workforce that understands science.�? Free of its context this latter statement would be unobjectionable, but since Wise is equating “science�? with “evolution,�? she is actually saying that the success of Ohio’s workforce depends on understanding evolution. The only way this could remotely be true is if Ohio’s economy was wholly dependent on the field of biology, but the last time I checked Ohio was not a hotbed of scientific discoveries. Even then, it would only be true if you accepted the underlying assumption of the sentence, which is that evolution drives science. While you hear scientists starting to say this more and more because of their fear that intelligent design might garner a respectable following, it is an absurd notion considering the vast number of scientific discoveries that were made before Darwin ever existed (anyone ever heard of Isaac Newton?) and considering that most discoveries today still have no connection to evolution.

Wise compounds her errors with the incredible paragraph that follows that last platitude: “The future of religious freedom in this country depends on the electorate understanding that modern science is not a threat to faith. Atheists who say science disproves God are misrepresenting science just as badly as the most disingenuous ‘creation-science’ peddlers.�? (Note that she places creation-science in quotes, emphasizing her belief that creation cannot be science, which demonstrates again that she is not a creationist).

Religious freedom depends on not being afraid of science? To the extent that this statement possesses any intellectual content, only its opposite could be remotely true. It is conceivable that because modern science insists that it has the corner on truth and because it also seems bent on proclaiming that everything exists due to natural processes (thus excluding God), it one day could threaten religious freedom by demanding that people should not be permitted to hold the “foolish�? belief that God created the world. But to believe that religious freedom will thrive only if people accept the claims of modern science is to adopt the notion that religion must remain in its own private sphere away from anything that matters in this world.

Wise again does the bidding of the Darwinists by spouting the lie that modern science does not seek to disprove God. Wise needs to have a chat with Richard Dawkins, the famed evolution apologist who, while being bigoted toward Christians, at least has the virtue of being honest about the ramifications of evolutionary theory. Simply saying over and over again (as scientists lately seem to keep doing) that evolution does not preclude God does not make it true. Evolutionary theory/Darwinism holds that all life was created by natural processes. By definition it excludes God. Even if one takes Genesis to be a statement of creation principles rather than a handbook of how life was created, evolution completely undermines Scripture because it includes no place for God in the creation process.

Some evolutionists will try to skate by this reality by saying that evolution only concerns how life became diversified, not how it came to be in the first place. But this is misleading in the extreme because Darwinism posits that life started from single-cell organisms and evolved into humanity, without any intervention from a creator. Even this version of evolution contradicts Scripture because Genesis tells us that God created man “in His image,�? not by plopping an amoeba into some primordial soup and then letting nature take its own course over millions of years. The cold-hard fact is that modern evolutionary theory has no place for God, and, in fact, its whole purpose is to explain the existence of life without making reference to God. In short—contra Wise—evolution equals atheism. To hold otherwise is intellectually incoherent. Thus, Wise is utterly and completely wrong that “[a]theists who say science disproves God are misrepresenting science.�? No, those atheists are honestly stating the goal of modern science: to do away with God. Wise is blissfully ignorant if she does not understand this.

Wise then goes on to misrepresent what occurred in the Dover, Pa. intelligent design trial, but it is not worth the time or space to correct those errors. Rather, it is perhaps best to close by noting the one statement in Wise’s column that is true. She says that “[t]here is no scientific controversy—only a religious one.�? Of course, in context Wise is parroting the Darwinist line that there is no disagreement among scientists about evolution; rather, the only controversy involves religious zealots who are “imposing their own religious view about creation on public school students with diverse religious beliefs.�? This is 100 percent wrong because there are reputable scientists who question Darwinism, and recommending, as the Ohio Board did, that students learn about what these scientists say are the weaknesses in evolutionary theory is not imposing a religious view on anyone—unless one equates all opposition of evolution to religion.

This last point hints at the sense in which Wise’s statement—that the controversy is a religious one—is true. Darwinism is the religious dogma in modern science. One cannot dissent or even raise small points of disagreement with the theory without being ridiculed as a religious nut. “Critical analysis�? is not acceptable because Darwinists believe that their theory cannot be wrong: you must accept it and then study science with evolution as its given baseline. Thus, Darwinism is akin to a religious belief (although this gives religion, at least the Christian variety, a bad name because Christianity does not insist on unquestioning belief; indeed, we are told to work out our faith “with fear and trembling.�?). The battle between Darwinism and creation is, at bottom, a religious war because neither side was present at the creation. Faith underlies both theories. The difference between them is that believers in creation are honest about it, whereas, believers in evolution such as Martha Wise must resort to nonsensical platitudes and heavy-handed propaganda to perpetuate the myth that they simply rely on objective scientific observation for their theory.

It would have been easier to respect Ms. Wise’s decision on the Ohio Board if she had just been honest about her reason for rejecting the “critical analysis�? recommendation, i.e., that she is a diehard Darwinist. Instead, she exercises the tiresome election year political tradition of attempting to have it both ways: She claims to be a Godly conservative who is standing up for religious freedom and the education of Ohio’s children, while she rejects the intellectual freedom of allowing dissent from Darwinism. In the end, her position is neither coherent nor believable, and hopefully those voting in her district will let her know that.

 

The University of Washington’s “Black Sheep”

It seems that students at the University of Washington could use a remedial course in the history of World War II.  The university’s student senate rejected a memorial for alumnus Gregory “Pappy�? Boyington of the famed “Black Sheep Squadron�? because they believe a military hero is not the kind of person that students should emulate.  One student said that she “didn’t believe a member of the Marine Corps was an example of the sort of person UW wanted to produce,�? while another opined that “many monuments at UW already commemorate rich white men.�?  The objections demonstrate an obvious disdain for the military and, as the above article details, complete ignorance about Boyington’s life.

 

International intrigue for school board

During a contentious meeting attended by almost 1,000 residents, the Upper St. Clair, Pa. School Board voted 5 to 4 to eliminate the district’s International Baccalaureate (IB) program. The controversy over whether the district would keep the program garnered national attention because IB has received accolades from many quarters—including from President Bush—as academically rigorous and able to provide students with an international perspective on subjects. But members of the a newly elected school board criticized IB for being too costly, anti-American, and anti-Christian. Opponents of the decision are considering litigation options in an attempt to get their way by other means, and the ACLU wants to be in on it.

The reaction of the school board seems out-of-sorts until you start looking more closely at the facts. For starters, the cost complaints by board members appear to be legitimate, as the program costs over $80,000 but only enrolls at most 10% of the district’s students. Moreover, the district’s Advanced Placement program achieves much of what the IB program does, so the extra money is being spent on a duplicative program.

Next, if one starts to delve into the program itself, it becomes readily apparent that much of what it peddles is not based on sound academics, but rather politically correct trends. For example, the mission statement of the IB program states that it “aims to develop inquiring, knowledgeable and caring young people who help to create a better and more peaceful world through intercultural understanding and respect.�? The curriculum of the program looks like a social engineer’s dream. The program’s connection to the organization Earth Charter is troubling to say the least, given that it was started by a United Nations task force and has a silly “warm-fuzzy�? agenda that reads like a 21st century Communist Manifesto. The program even appears to be pushing a certain moral point of view. One exam question, for example, asks students to “discuss the link between a specific marriage form (e.g. monogamy, cross-cousin marriage or arranged marriage) and gender relations.�? Given these facts, it should come as no surprise that the Upper St. Clair Board is not alone in feeling uneasy about the bent of the IB program.

This entry would not be complete if it let slide the absurdity of the student protest of this school board action. Some students have been wearing black arm bands to display their disapproval of the school board’s position, saying that the bands “symbolize the death of democracy.�? Apparently the IB program has not done a very good job of explaining what democracy is because this vote represents a perfect example of it at work. The newly elected school board members followed through on their campaign promises to start reigning in district spending by cutting an unnecessary program. They did so only after a spirited open-forum meeting in which parents and students alike expressed their views on the subject. And in the end, the board voted on the fate of the program. If only governments worked this well all the time. The fact that students would wear black arm bands, traditionally a symbol worn to protest war, demonstrates ignorance, not political intelligence. Likewise, for parents to resort to litigation sets a poor example for their children with regard to accepting a democratic defeat. IB’s educational achievement potential does not look very promising.

 

The ACLU: Saving children from the Bible

For more than 50 years the New Hanover County, North Carolina School District has been offering elective courses on the Bible in its schools, but now the ACLU figures it is time they got investigated for it. The ACLU’s presence has the district questioning its traditional arrangement of allowing a church-supported group to hire and pay the teachers of the courses as well as whether to have the courses at all.

This is another classic case of the ACLU needlessly making the world safe from Christianity. You really have to wonder whether the ACLU is serving any useful purpose whatsoever. Yes, it whines about the conditions of Guantanamo Bay terrorist detainees and it spreads misinformation about the NSA’s international wiretapping program, but those efforts largely fall on deaf ears. The ACLU’s true impact niche has come in searching throughout America to find, sue, and (in tandem with the federal courts) uproot every last sign of public piety in existence. Really, other than giving rich liberals a convenient place to dump their money so that they can feel strangely patriotic, the ACLU has become nothing more than a glorified censor of Christianity. The ACLU took in over $100 million last year alone; just think about how pathetic it is that they are using those resources to investigate little Bible classes in New Hanover County, N.C..

In a way Christians should feel proud that an organization with such might expends so much energy trying to keep us out of the public eye. We must be doing something right.

 

Some Empire State education sanity?

The liberal state that has been dominated for years by its teachers union may be turning a corner in that regard. New York Governor George Pataki has offered a proposal that would give New Yorkers in poor performing public school districts a $500 education tax credit that they could use for paying tuition, books, or supplies at parochial and other private schools. Though the amount of the credit is paltry, a victory for education credits in New York would be huge nationally given the power of the education lobby in the Empire state. The lobby’s power may be weakening, however, due to a coalition of conservative advocates for the private sector and minority parents fed up with poor public schools, with the latter pushing Democrats to support the idea.

The last straw for the people of New York may have been a lawsuit backed by the education lobby that resulted in a federal district court order last year commanding the Assembly to pour $5.6 billion more annually into New York City’s public schools. Governor Pataki has appealed the decision and the Assembly has shown no eagerness to act on the order anytime soon. If the Assembly does enact the tax credit program along with the governor’s other proposal to substantially expand the state’s charter schools, it could mean that the National Education Association of New York–which is looked upon as the heart of its national namesake–will have suffered an attack from which it cannot recover.

 

Focus on philosophy

Is intelligent design a scientific theory? Not according to Father Jonathan Morris. But atheists might want to withhold their “amen!�? because he says Neo-Darwinian evolution is not science either. So what are they? They are philosophies: concepts that offer possible explanations for why things are the way they are, whereas, modern science simply deals with what things are through the study of empirical evidence. Thus, Morris concludes that both intelligent design and Neo-Darwinism should be booted out of the science classroom and placed in Philosophy 101.

What Morris says here is hardly a novel idea; Phillip Johnson has been saying it for at least 10 years. Where Morris may have the edge on Johnson is in putting the idea in simpler terms. However, what is really of interest in the paradigm Morris sets up is whether it is a good thing that science has morphed into this isolated, objective study of nature and nothing else. As a rule, disciplines do bleed into one another at various points, but it is fairly easy to maintain distinctness between the various disciplines. For example, the study of music separates cleanly from the study of history, and the study of art will not be confused with the study of medicine. But one has to wonder whether science is or should be an exception to this general rule.

The reason for pondering it as an exception is that when one studies nature it is only natural to ask how the things in nature got that way. To pretend that human beings—who are naturally inquisitive by nature—will be content in their given field to just observe and record results rather than speculate about how the thing observed wound up the way it did seems foolhardy. If people are inevitably going to ask why and how, then perhaps we should not artificially short-circuit the coverage of the discipline of science. Allow scientists to speculate about how things ended up the way they are but insist that they openly admit that this is what they are doing.

This would be the opposite of Father Morris’s proposal of kicking both intelligent design and Neo-Darwinism out of science class; instead, allow both of them in through broadening the definition of science. Of course, scientists would adamantly object to such a proposal because it takes away the one tool they currently hold that makes them different than most other disciplines: objectivity. In this post-modern age it is acknowledged that those in almost every other discipline study with various biases that affect the outcome of their work. For example, historians have been forced to admit to biases in the retelling of history, art critics have had to concede that what they call “good�? art is affected by personal preferences, and studies produced by economists will be influenced by a myriad of personal viewpoints, such as the economist’s view of wealth creation. But scientists grab hold of the mantle of objectivity and cling to it like a favorite teddy bear or security blanket, and society lets them keep it.

By re-expanding the definition of science to include philosophies of origins, the curtain is pulled back from the Wizard of Oz show being perpetrated on the public by complicit scientists. Scientists cling to objectivity because it gives them power: in today’s world, if something is “scientifically tested�? or “scientifically proven,�? people pay attention to it and they believe it. Thus, when “scientists�? claim that humans exist because they evolved from monkeys over millions of years, many believe them despite the fact that the scientists are not talking about an observable fact at all. The current paradigm of science allows scientists to hide their faith behind the buzz word of “objectivity�? when they actually select what they study and reach the conclusions they do based on their theory of origins.

An expanded, honest definition of science would produce more honest scientists, or, at least, a more discerning public that can decide without a smokescreen whether to swallow what the scientists are serving.  Such a change would improve the discipline of science, bringing it in line with the rest of the post-modern world.

 

The Maine question about vouchers

The Maine Supreme Judicial Court heard arguments this week concerning a challenge to a state law that prohibits the use of tax-supported tuition vouchers for religious schools.  For almost a century, Maine’s tuition-voucher program included religious schools, but in 1980 the state’s attorney general decided that their involvement violated the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment.  However, because of a 2002 U.S. Supreme Court ruling, it is likely that the inclusion of religious schools in the program would no longer be considered a constitutional violation.  Whether their exclusion violates the Constitution’s guarantees of free exercise of religion and equal protection of the laws–as the plaintiffs contend it does–is another matter entirely.

It certainly does not violate the free exercise of religion because a person’s exercise of religion is not impaired by not being able to attend a religious school.  Equal protection is a better argument because Maine’s only reason for discriminating against religious schools had been its belief that supporting them with taxpayer money violated the Establishment Clause.  Maine’s religious schools never should have been disqualified from the program in the first place because helping children attend school does not tend toward “establish[ing]�? a religion, which is why the program had gone unchallenged for almost 100 years.  And now that the U.S. Supreme Court has given its stamp of approval to parent-based tuition vouchers, there is absolutely no doubt about the constitutionality of including religious schools in Maine’s voucher program.  Since the state no longer has a constitutional reason to discriminate, a plausible argument could be made that excluding religious schools because they are religious violates the equal protection of the laws.

However, ultimately a state’s power over how it expends taxpayer dollars is plenary.  It can choose not to fund any schools at all or only some schools, just as it can choose, for example, to spend money on building roads instead of railroad tracks.  So, while the wisdom of Maine’s policy certainly can and should be questioned, it is likely that Maine’s high court will find that current policy choice of excluding religious schools from the tuition-voucher program does not run afoul of the Constitution’s guarantee of equal protection of the laws.