A
Caution Concerning the
Kansas State Board of Education Decision
|
Author: Doug Sharp |
Essays by
Author |
The Kansas State Board of Education recently made the decision to eliminate certain references to macroevolution in state testing requirements. Although we agree with the spirit of this decision, we are cautious concerning this implementation.
Macroevolution is the direct attempt to explain the origin of life from molecules to man in purely naturalistic terms. In doing so, it is an affront to Christians because it deliberately tries to get rid of God as the creator of life. The idea that man is a result of millions of happy accidents that mutated their way from slime through the food chain to monkeys should be offensive to every thinking person.
But, we don't think that it helps our cause to discourage its teaching.
Instead, we would rather the entire story be told. The more a student
understands evolution, especially the details concerning how evolutionists
arrive at their conclusions, the less likely they are to believe it. But, the
less they know about it, they will be even more unprepared for the onslaught
they will receive at college accompanied by the peer pressure to believe it.
For our family the solution was Christian school. We believe that the
foundation for all academic subjects should be spiritual. Without a sense of
right and wrong as a philosophical basis, how can we claim to be able to teach
anything? At Christian school, our daughters graduated with more knowledge of
evolution than most college sophomores have. That understanding will prepare
them as they continue their higher education. The current situation in most
public schools, though, is to teach only one side, which is part of the story.
They do not receive the whole picture as is taught in Christian schools. We
have been fortunate to afford Christian school, but in order to do so, we have
to pay twice: once in taxes, and again in tuition. Many families cannot afford
to do this.
To paraphrase Clarence Darrow of the Scopes trial: "It is a form of bigotry not to teach both models." Now the shoe is on the other foot. Originally the church tried to argue from a position of authority and not information, now it is the evolutionists doing the same. It is the evolutionists that sound bigoted, moralistic and condescending. It is a sad day in this nation when it is considered immoral to teach morality in the public school.
Proponents of evolution insist that you can believe in evolution without losing your faith in God. Certainly there are some that claim this. But do Richard Dawkins, Stephen Jay Gould, and Eugenie Scott say that Jesus is their Lord? Do they believe, trust in and rely upon the Bible as God's word? If not, I rest my case. If those who are most vocal for the teaching of evolution, saying that you can mix God and evolution, do not themselves exhibit any sign of belief themselves, then they are by their lives and example living proof that belief in evolution can be harmful to your faith in God. As for theistic evolutionists, it is much easier for them to alter their interpretation of the Bible to fit their thinking and lifestyle than it is to alter their thinking and lifestyle to fit the straightforward meaning of the Bible.
I, however, am glad that my children learned as much about evolution as they could, because the more they understood it and knew how to interpret the evidence, the more it became self-evident that the theory does not explain the origin of life. The mechanism that is generally called "evolution" or microevolution is actually something that the creator instilled in his creation to produce great variety. It is a perfect example of object-oriented programming, where genetic code can be cut from one place and pasted in another. This produces lateral evolution, variety within a species using the creator's standard blueprint in the genetic code. Mutations are "bugs," errors that produce unexpected results. Rarely, if ever, will a "bug" actually produce an unintended feature of a program that actually works and improves the process. But, macroevolution is the unobserved belief that random chance mutations produce an increase in genetic information. I think that this hardly qualifies as science.
Yes, teach macroevolution, but not the sleight of hand that goes along with it. Tell the whole story, and do not bow to the pressure of those who threaten to sue if the evidence against evolution is taught.
This diagram illustrates why a creation-evolution controversy exists. For the most part, both models overlap in explaining the scientific evidence. Some evidence is better explained by the creation model, other evidence appears to be better explained by the evolution model. Neither model has all of the answers, but both models attempt to stretch their boundaries to fit in as much evidence as they can. For the evidence they cannot explain, each model fills in with a degree of faith. In addition, faith is a part of both models in that they believe that their explanation is correct versus the other model. It is this controversy that makes the creation-evolution issue so interesting to study.
Unfortunately, the Kansas State Board of Education, with new members, reversed its decision 5-4. The original decision was much better than doing nothing, but now we have the original unjust situation restored. Kansas children will now only hear one side presented by the evolution evangelists.
Return to the top of this Essay
This page last updated 8/19/1999
>Back to the Revolution Against Evolution
home page
The Creation Bookstore
Revolution Against Evolution TV Show
Creation Essays
Seminars and Class Schedule
Online Books
Other online resources
Frequently Asked Questions
The Amy Foundation Website
Mount Hope Church
The Revolution Against Evolution has had over one million visitors since 4/28/97.
. 
.
Contact rae.org or send comments about this page HERE.