The following is the opinion and analysis of the writer:
Imagine for a moment you’re attempting to solve a problem that, in the end, has no final answer. Now imagine that as you proceed, your labors are regularly rewarded with ever-increasing insights into its true nature. As you acquire more knowledge and understanding, you come to appreciate that the problem itself is but a vehicle to carry you along an unending path of discovery rather than a promise of ultimate truth. And with this realization, you find yourself not only undaunted by its endlessness, but inspired, if not humbled, by the anticipation of untold enlightenment.
Now contrast this with the stark opposition of a static, unyielding worldview overconfidently claiming ownership of the one and only immutable truth, that promises to assuage all the uncertainties and insecurities of a perplexing world, but at the cost of an uncompromising conformity enforced through threats of censure, or worse.
These distinctly incompatible perspectives succinctly characterize the foundational conflict between the domineering doctrinaire mindset of religion and the open-minded quest for understanding and genuine meaning that is the goal of science.
Ever since Thomas Jefferson’s first statement of his famous metaphorical wall of separation between Church and State, religious zealots have maintained their own wall of separation between doctrine and reason, insisting that Jefferson’s true intention was always to favor protected status for religion over secularism. These determined proponents, constantly chipping away at the canonical meaning of Jefferson’s symbolism and bolstered by recent ideological shifts in the Supreme Court, now hope to see their radical interpretation finally become official.
In the latest iteration of Arizona’s very own perennial legislative assault on Church-State separation, State Senator David Farnsworth of Mesa has resurrected the campaign to force Intelligent Design into the science curriculum as a legitimate challenge to the authority of evolutionary theory. As a consummate creationist, he proudly displays his ignorance of evolutionary theory by mockingly offering up the classic pejorative mischaracterization of its central thesis as proof of its absurdity, namely that humans came from monkeys.
Molecular biology and genetics establish beyond a reasonable doubt that all living things are related in a universal sense, the evidence of which is inscribed in their DNA as a timeless record of inheritance through the ages of nature’s successes accrued in the genes of all present-day living organisms. As far as theories go, evolution enjoys one of the greatest degrees of certainty of any scientific discipline. Intelligent design, on the other hand, dogmatically demands that complex phenomena must necessarily involve transcendental agency, a position that deprives the universe of its own phenomenological nature. Complexity is proof of God.
Science education is ultimately about learning the scientific method, arguably the most important discovery in human history. By favoring a minimum of explanatory necessities, its principal arbiter, Occam’s razor, excludes as unhelpful superfluous add-ons such as deities. By introducing the uninitiated to the wealth of knowledge accumulated through the application of its powerful method, science not only enlightens but engenders a frame of mind inherently resistant to the untoward influences of ideological nonsense.
It is unsupportable to insist that a subject having no pedagogical connection whatsoever to the matter at hand be foisted upon the discussion. A class teaching science is deterred from its mission by the introduction of unscientific dogma under the guise of expositional fairness. Forcing the inclusion of moral didacticism into a forum committed to objectivity serves only to corrupt knowledge. Teaching creationism alongside evolution is tantamount to teaching algebra during Sunday sermon. The goal of science class is to teach science. Period.
Science and religion are polar opposites. The former has led us steadily forward in unlocking the mysteries of existence and augmenting the quality of life, while the latter has remained throughout history the blunt instrument of oppression used to cudgel humankind into submission through discouragement of independent thought and deterrence of self-determination. With conformity as its goal, religion tirelessly assaults the manifest intent of the Constitution to safeguard the freedom of discovery and the irrepressible quest for enlightenment that permeates the human spirit — an ideal sustainable only by prohibiting in the classroom what necessarily must remain in the church.
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