The State Board of Education in Texas voted on Friday to remove a long-time science curriculum rule that required “strengths and weaknesses” of scientific theories be covered in the classroom.

It also struck down two proposed sections that would have required students in high school biology classes to study the “sufficiency or insufficiency” of common ancestry and natural selection of species.

But it settled on a compromise that will require teachers to discuss “all sides” of scientific theories with their students. This may allow both sides to claim a victory of sorts.

Evolution proponents were especially alarmed by the “strengths and weaknesses” clause because it implied a “weakness” where few scientists say one exists. But some biblical critics of evolution will no doubt be happy by the “all sides” provision. 

The old ”strengths and weaknesses” wording was regarded by many as an attempt by social and religious conservatives to raise questions about Charles Darwin’s theory of natural selection, which is popularly known as his theory of evolution.

Some of the supporters of the “strengths and weaknesses rule” said  they just wanted open discussion and accused the evolutionists of trying to stifle debate.

Critics contended that maintaining the rule would have given Biblical creationists or proponents of “intelligent design” theory an open door to get their anti-evolution agenda into the classroom.

Some fear the new “all sides” rule will still allow this to happen.

“The word ‘weaknesses’ no longer appears in the science standards. But the document still has plenty of potential footholds for creationist attacks on evolution to make their way into Texas classrooms,” said Kathy Miller, president of the Texas Freedom Network, an advocacy group that has long been at odds with religious conservatives on a range of issues.

The Dallas Morning News urged the board to vote out the “strength and weaknesses” rule in an editorial on Thursday under the headline “No Doubt About Science.”

“Even many people of faith accept the theory of evolution,” it noted.

For the most part, the two sides are light years apart. Many creationists believe the planet is a few thousand years old. The scientific consensus is closer to 4.5 billion years.

Intelligent design theory holds that the complexity of life would not have been possible without a designer. (And that designer would be God).

The vast majority of scientists accept evolution at least in its broad outlines, and the theory of natural selection (once again, to use the term favored by Darwin himself) is the foundation of modern biology.

Scientists point to an abundance of evidence to support the notion that species evolve. These include the species divergence found between islands, even those close apart (this was the clue that got Darwin thinking); the fossil record (no mammals in those Precambrian rocks); DNA testing (the great apes are indeed our closest living relatives).

But what do you think? Is it not right to let students look at all sides of scientific issues, provided that they stick to science? Or does this open the door to a religious agenda that may not be ground in science?

(Photo: The skeleton of an Ophtalmosaurus sea reptile on display at the Christie’s auction house in Paris February 12, 2009.  REUTERS/Gonzalo Fuentes (FRANCE)

Just in time for Charles Darwin’s 200th birthday next week, the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life has posted an extensive research package examining the debate about evolution, Darwinism and religion in the United States. “The Debate over Evolution” is a treasure trove of information about the debate and especially useful for the lists breaking down views of the main religious groups and the political fight over Darwinism state by state.

(Photo: British Darwin commemorative stamp, 29 Dec 2008/Royal Mail)

Here are the main entries:

• Overview: Fighting Over Evolution
• Darwin and His Theory of Evolution
• The Social and Legal Dimensions of the Evolution Debate in the U.S.
• Religious Groups’ Views on Evolution
• Fighting Over Darwin, State by State
• Evolution: A Timeline
• Graphic: Religious Differences on the Question of Evolution

Speaking of Darwin, we’ve done several posts about the Turkish anti-Darwin campaigner Harun Yahya and his Islamic creationst campaign against evolution. Most of the attention on this has been on his mega-book Atlas of Creation, how it’s being distributed in Europe and what the reaction to it has been.

His office has just sent me the photo at right of an anti-evolution stand they’ve set up in the mall at the Burj Dubai skyscraper in Dubai. 
We’re bound to hear a lot more about Darwin, evolution and faith this year, as it’s also the 150th anniversary of the publication of On The Origin Of Species. This debate has been going on for decades and the pros and cons have been gone through a thousand times. Is there anything new to say about this?

A new book on Charles Darwin says a passionate hatred of slavery was fundamental to his theory of natural selection, which challenged the assumption held by many at the time that blacks and whites were separate species.

“Darwin’s Sacred Cause” is among the first of dozens of works about the 19th century scientist to appear in 2009, the bicentenary of his birth and 150th anniversary of the publication of his groundbreaking “On the Origin of Species”. You can see a report here about the book by my colleague Mike Collett-White.

I find the choice of title by the authors Adrian Desmond and James Moore to be an interesting one. Other Darwin biographers have written of his gradual loss of religious faith — and he is today a target of scorn by many religious conservatives who would regard his cause as anything but sacred.

A glance at my “Webster’s Comphrensive Dictionary” suggests most meanings for the word do indeed relate to religion: “set apart or dedicated to religious use; hallowed” is the first. But it also says it can mean “dedicated to a person or purpose” and even “set apart from evil” – definitions which do not explicitly evoke things divine.

Still, if my own first reaction is anything to go by, it is indeed a clever word to insert in a title about a book on Darwin.

I may just have to read the book myself to satisfy my curiousity on that score …

(Photo: Giant tortoises on the Galapagos islands, where Darwin’s theory of natural selection was inspired, 29 April 2007/Guillermo Granja)

Social and religious conservatives in Texas suffered a setback on Thursday when the State Board of Education narrowly voted to ditch a requirement that high school science teachers cover the “strengths and weaknesses” of Charles Darwin’s theory of natural selection, which is more popularly known as the theory of evolution.

A final vote on the entire science curriculum is expected today. You can see reports here and here.

The rule to teach “both sides of the evolution debate” had been in place since the 1980s, but national interest has been rekindled in recent years by attempts to get Biblical creationism taught in U.S. schools in one form of another.

Proponents of intelligent design — which holds that life is so complex that it must have had an ultimate creator — have suffered a number of setbacks.

Some in the pro-evolution crowd — which includes just about all of the mainstream science community in the United States — contend that introducing “flaws” or ”criticism” of the theory of natural selection is a smokescreen for creationists who can claim that just discussing “doubt” does not in itself signal the promotion of a religious agenda.

Many in the scientific community say there is little doubt on this score or at least the kind of doubt suggested by the proponents of creationism and intelligent design.

The Dallas Morning News on Thursday quoted Eugenie Scott, the executive director of the National Center for Science Education, as saying that: “There are no weaknesses in the theory of evolution.”

What do you think? Is the Texas school board living up to President Barack Obama’s pledge this week “to restore science to its rightful place?”

(Photo: The new Charles Darwin postage stamp, issued by Britian’s Royal Mail to commemorate his 200th birthday this year and the 150th anniversary of the publication of his seminal work. REUTERS/Royal Mail, 29 Dec 2008)

Vienna Cardinal Christoph Schönborn is one of the Catholic Church’s most vocal critics of what he calls evolutionism, which he defines as an ideology that applies Darwin’s theory of natural selection to a wide variety of questions beyond biology. He usually directs his criticism at scientists and philosophers who say evolution proves that God does not exist.

(Photo: Cardinal Schönborn, 16 March 2007/Leonhard Foege)

In an interview with the Austrian provincial newspaper Vorarlberger Nachrichten on Jan. 5, Schönborn, a former student and close associate of Pope Benedict, said his criticism also applied to the current financial crisis:

Q, One of your favourite topics is evolution and creation. Wouldn’t it be more reasonable to devote yourself to more practical things than those that cannot be proven anyway?

A. Look at the current economic crisis. The question of evolutionism and the economic crisis are very closely linked. What we can call the ideological Darwinist concept that the stronger survives has led to the economic situation we’re in today. I think that if education only focuses on making young people fit for the rat race and doesn’t teach them the great human values that society needs, it’s because it’s based on an image of humanity linked to ideological evolutionism. So it has very, very practical consequences.

Q. Where is this discussion leading and what can emerge at the end of it?

A. We can’t say, but (scientific) research continues. Very successful, very exciting. On the one hand, it certainly is going very strongly in the direction that says all life can really be proved to be linked together. In this respect, the scientific theory of evolution is, of course, supported and carried by very strong arguments.

(Photo:Staff at Lehman Brothers in London, 11 Sept 2008/Kevin Coombs)

On the other hand, one must clearly highlight the distinctive qualities of humans, their dignity and their intellectual abilities and responsibility in the face of reductive thinking that understands them in a materialistic way or as just a product of evolution. That is certainly insufficient.

The interview is here in German (registration required) and a summary (open access) in the Vienna daily Die Presse is here.

The latest issue of The Economist has a provocative essay on Darwinism asking if Charles Darwin’s insights can be used profitably by policymakers. You can read it online here.

“America … executes around 40 people a year for murder. Yet it still has a high murder rate. Why do people murder each other when they are almost always caught and may, in America at least, be killed themselves as a result?” it asks.

It goes on to ask why men still earn more than women 40 years after the feminist revolution and why racism persists.

“Traditionally, the answers to such questions, and many others about modern life, have been sought in philosophy, sociology, even religion. But the answers that have come back are generally unsatisfying. They describe, rather than explain. They do not get to the nitty-gritty of what it truly is to be human. Policy based on them does not work. This is because they ignore the forces that made people what they are: the forces of evolution.” it says.

The essay is not proposing some new theory of eugenics or related nonsense — it just lays out interesting areas where human behavior may be explained by evolution and asks if this could help inform public policy.

What is of particular interest to readers of this blog is the waves that Darwin’s theory of natural selection — more popularly referred to as his theory of evolution — has stirred among many of the world’s religious faithful. And as 2009 will mark the 150th anniversary of the publication of “On The Origin of Species,” one can expect a flood of Darwin-related debates and publications in the coming months.

The late American historian Richard Hofstadter wrote on the 100th anniversary of Darwin’s seminal work that “… mankind has lived so long under the brilliant light of evolutionary science that we tend to take its insights for granted.”

Fifty years later, in Hofstadter’s America, many evangelical Christians dispute the claim that Darwin’s theory provides “insights.” They argue that the Bible is the literal word of God and any theory that suggests organisms evolved over hundreds of millions of years or that we are related to the Great Apes cannot be true.

Proponents of “Intelligent Design” maintain that life is so complex that it must have had a creator. Critics say this is biblical creationism under a different name and that its claims to use scientific methods are absurd.

Darwin’s theory has long been the foundation of modern biological inquiry. Its supporters,  nearly all of the scientific community, draw on an abundance of evidence to support their view, including the diversity of life on islands, even those in close proximity to each other.

This highlights how isolation appears to spur evolution in different directions, which is what got Darwin going in the first place.

We have written and blogged at length on Darwin’s reception among various religious groups. The Vatican believes the theory of natural selection is compatible with the Bible; within the Islamic world there is a growing creationist movement.

Darwin is certain to stir up more fiery debates in 2009.

Turkey’s Muslim creationist Harun Yahya is not satisfied with sending lavish books against evolution and Darwin to western schools. He’s now running an anti-evolution essay contest with a top prize of $64,000. He has just doubled the prize money from $32,000 and boosted the maximum length for essays from 15 to 60 pages.

“The competitors of the competition “Why Is the Theory of Evolution Invalid?” held by Science Research Foundation had some righteous demands, stating that given the too many dilemmas of Darwinism, 15 pages is too short for their essays and that the time is inadequate,” his group has written in a message I just received. “The purpose of this competition is to raise young people’s awareness of Darwinism, which has inflicted immense damage on mankind and to put them on their guard against this terrible fraud in science.”

The procedure is a bit complicated. One hundred participants have to first be accepted on the basis of the essays. They will then have to take a test consisting of 80 questions about evolution. The announcement says the test will be held in December 2009 at a location to be announced.

This made me wonder about who would enter this contest. Harun Yahya is one of the few Muslims active in the creationism field otherwise dominated by conservative Christians. These Christians are often — but not always — sceptical to hostile towards Islam. So would they approve of their children submitting essays to Harun Yahya’s contest? Would the creationist museums in the United States advertise this attractive offer? I can’t imagine there is such a jackpot anywhere else for a creationist essay.

The Church of England has just issued an apology to Charles Darwin for opposing his theory of evolution when The Origin of Species first came out 150 years ago. The Roman Catholic Church says it sees no need to say “sorry” for its initial hostility to the same theory. But both are now reconciled to evolution as solid science and are getting active in presenting their view that it is not incompatible with Christian faith. Is one approach better than the other to get this message across?

Next year’s double anniversary — the 200th anniversary of Darwin’s birth and 150th anniversary of the publication of The Origin of Species — is one reason to speak up about evolution. Another is the fact that evolution has become an increasingly controversial public issue, especially in the United States, and the debate is dominated by mostly conservative Protestant creationists and “intelligent design” supporters on one side and agnostic/atheistic scientists on the other.

That debate is so entangled in U.S. politics — the latest chapter being the questions about Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin’s views on teaching creationism in schools — that a less polarised view has a hard time getting heard. Trying to walk a middle path can be a tricky business, too, as Rev Michael Reiss in Britain has learned. A biologist and Anglican priest, he has just had to resign as the Royal Society’s director of education after causing an uproar among scientists by saying creationism could be discussed as a “world view” in science class. He wasn’t advocating it, but thought that simply telling students with creationist views that they were wrong would turn them off science completely.

So what’s the best way for anyone who wants to get a word in edgewise? Apologies to a man long dead? Arguments that may not be heard? Something else?

One reason for the different approaches may be that the churches are responding to  different poles of this debate. The Church of England seems more concerned about arguments from the “new atheists” such as Oxford University’s Richard Dawkins. The Vatican seems to be thinking more about creationists and “intelligent design” supporters.

On a new website the Church of England has devoted to Darwin, Rev Dr Malcolm Brown, its director of mission and public affairs, declared that “good religion needs good science”. The CoE opposed evolution back then, he said, but it was, after all, “not such an earth-shattering idea”. He continued:

Darwin’s immense achievement was to develop a big theory which went a long way to explaining aspects of the world around us. But to treat it as an all-embracing theory of everything is to travesty Darwin’s work. The difficulty is that his theory of natural selection has been so effective within the scientific community, and so easily understood in outline by everybody, that it has been inflated into a general theory of everything – which is not only erroneous but dangerous.”

After explaining the current Anglican view, Brown added: “Charles Darwin: 200 years from your birth, the Church of England owes you an apology for misunderstanding you and, by getting our first reaction wrong, encouraging others to misunderstand you still. We try to practice the old virtues of ‘faith seeking understanding’ and hope that makes some amends. But the struggle for your reputation is not over yet, and the problem is not just your religious opponents but those who falsely claim you in support of their own interests. Good religion needs to work constructively with good science – and I dare to suggest that the opposite may be true as well.”

The Vatican started off with theology on Tuesday as it announced a conference next March on evolution with  scientists, theologians and philosophers. “I would like to repeat from the outset … that there is no incompatibility between the theory of evolution and the message of the Bible and with theology,” Archbishop Gianfranco Ravasi, the Vatican’s culture minister, told journalists in Rome.

Asked about the Anglican apology, he said: “Maybe we should abandon the idea of issuing apologies as if history was a court eternally in session … Darwin was never condemned by the Catholic Church nor was his book ever banned … The attitude of the Anglican Church is curious and significant, the style belongs to a mentality a bit different from ours.” 

Professor Phillip Sloan of Notre Dame University, which will co-host the conference with the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome, put the issue in wider context. “In the United States, and now elsewhere, we have an on-going public debate over evolution that has social, political and religious dimensions. Most of this debate has been taking place without a strong Catholic theological presence, and the discussion has suffered accordingly.”

Rev Marc Leclerc, a Jesuit philosophy professor at the Gregorian, said Darwin’s work was more often discussed ideologically than scientifically, which has led to a stand-off between what he called evolutionism and creationism. The “intelligent design” argument had added to the confusion by saying only divine planning could explain evolution, he said. That amounted to confusing divine purpose and a mechanism, “whereas these are obviously two distinct planes”.

As Pope Benedict delivered his major speech on faith and culture in Paris today, some of those listening in the medieval hall and in the press centre listened closely to hear what he would say about … Islam. The Muslim faith was by no means the subject of the lecture addressed to 700 French intellectuals. But two years ago to the day, the former theology professor gave a similar lecture in Regensburg and, seemingly out of nowhere, quoted a Byzantine emperor saying that Islam was violent and irrational. The reaction in the Muslim world back then was violent and irrational. So would he make another gaffe?

France is the European country with the largest Muslim minority. Eight Muslim leaders were especially invited to the speech because time constraints made it hard to fit in a meeting with them at any other time. It seemed so unlikely that Benedict would say anything controversial that it hardly seemed worth looking out for. But in the speech, he warned about “fundamentalism” and “fundamentalist fanatacism.” As soon as it was over, journalists wondered whether this referred to Islam. Editors checked with correspondents. Was this Regensburg redux?

No, it wasn’t — it was actually a B16 shot across a different bow. The context of the speech makes clear that his first reference to fundamentalism meant Christian fundamentalists. It was a clear statement that the Bible cannot be read literally, without any reference to its context and history. Why he chose to say this now is not clear. The Vatican has just announced it would hold a conference next March on Darwin and evolution, a subject it said has caused many “emotional and ideological reactions.” Could he be thinking of creationists?

Here’s the passage about Christian fundamentalism:

“Scripture requires exegesis, and it requires the context of the community in which it came to birth and in which it is lived. This is where its unity is to be found, and here too its unifying meaning is opened up. To put it yet another way: there are dimensions of meaning in the word and in words which only come to light within the living community of this history-generating word. Through the growing realisation of the different layers of meaning, the word is not devalued, but in fact appears in its full grandeur and dignity. Therefore the Catechism of the Catholic Church can rightly say that Christianity does not simply represent a religion of the book in the classical sense. It perceives in the words the word, the Logos itself, which spreads its mystery through this multiplicity. This particular structure of the Bible issues a constantly new challenge to every generation. It excludes by its nature everything that today is known as fundamentalism. In effect, the word of God can never simply be equated with the letter of the text.”

The second reference opposed “fundamentalist fanaticism” to “subjective arbitrariness,” two extremes he said societies could fall into if they rejected religion and reason. That could apply to anybody. Given the crowd he had seated before him, the audience for this comment seemed to be sceptical French secularists who believe religion equals unreason and should be kept out of the public sphere. They are slowly being put a bit on the defensive, as my analysis earlier today on the return of religion pointed out.

The Muslims in the audience don’t seem to have read anything into the references to fundamentalism. Haydar Demiryurek, a vice-president of the French Muslim Council, told me: “It was a very good speech, very interesting and very eloquent. It was a privilege to be there and get to meet the pope afterwards.”

The Vatican famously “thinks in centuries”. It’s useful to remember that when reading the announcement from its Pontifical Council for Culture about a conference it plans to hold in Rome on Darwin and evolution. Pope Benedict has shown a keen interest in the issue and debated it in a closed session with some former doctoral students in 2006. The Vatican now wants to hold a week-long public conference next March entitled “Biological Evolution: Facts and Theories — A Critical Evaluation 150 years after the The Origin of Species“.

The announcement (translated from the original and more florid Italian) said: “150 years after the publication of Charles Darwin’s Origin of Species, it is difficult to find a scientific sphere entirely free from direct or indirect influences of the theory of evolution. Especially in recent decades, this theory has experienced so many changes, and such significant changes, that a critical reflection is very urgent. Moreover, there are obvious philosophical and theological problems raised by the theory of evolution that cause many emotional and even ideological reactions.”

The conference from March 3 to 7 will be organised by the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome and the University of Notre Dame in the United States, as part of a wider project called STOQ (Science, Theology and the Ontological Quest). It will be attended, the announcement declared with a flourish, by “luminaries of science and famous philosophers and theologians”.

Some defenders of “intelligent design” might try to claim that this signals a Vatican rethink on evolution. Caveat emptor! After initially fighting Darwin, the Roman Catholic Church accepted evolution as a scientific theory while rejecting any materialist conclusion Darwinists might draw from it to reject the religious belief in God as the creator of the universe. This puts Catholic teaching somewhere between the (often agnostic) Darwinists and the (often evangelical Protestant) anti-Darwinists.

Before concluding that the Vatican is shifting position, consider an interesting fact. The liberal Swiss theologian Hans Küng disagrees with some Church doctrines so much that he has been barred from teaching as a Catholic theologian since 1979. But he and Benedict agree on this issue (as he showed in his 2006 book Der Anfang aller Dinge — The Beginning of All Things — pictured right). In fact, as Küng told me after his meeting with Benedict in 2005, the pope urged him to speak out more frequently in public about the Catholic position on evolution.