San Jose Mercury News wrote:Evolution site under fire
COUPLE'S LAWSUIT SAYS UC-BERKELEY WEB SITE FOR TEACHERS INVOLVES RELIGION
By Becky Bartindale and Lisa Krieger
Mercury News
Operators of a University of California-Berkeley Web site that is designed to help teachers teach evolution are being sued by a California couple who say the site improperly strays into religion.
Defendants include two top biologists from the UC Museum of Paleontology, which runs the Understanding Evolution Web site (
http://evolution. berkeley.edu) and an official from the National Science Foundation, who is named because the foundation provided more than $400,000 in public funding for the site.
The lawsuit is one of many skirmishes under way across the country over how evolution is taught in the schools. Some anti-evolution efforts are being pressed by proponents of ``intelligent design,'' the idea that living organisms are so complex they must have been created by a higher intelligence.
But the Granite Bay couple who filed the Web site suit, Jeanne Caldwell and her husband, Larry Caldwell, who is representing her in the lawsuit, say they are not proponents of intelligent design. They object to the teaching of evolution as scientific fact.
``Yes, I'm a Christian,'' said Jeanne Caldwell, ``but I would not categorize myself as an ID proponent. I believe God created the world.''
Suit specifics
The suit, which was filed last month, specifically objects to portions of the Understanding Evolution Web site that deal with the interplay of science and religion. For example, it challenges the site's linking to doctrinal statements from a variety of religions to demonstrate that ``most Christian and Jewish religious groups have no conflict with evolution.''
That amounts to a government endorsement of certain religious groups over others, the suit contends, and is an effort ``to modify the beliefs of public school science students so they will be more willing to accept evolutionary theory as true.''
An attorney representing the Berkeley scientists said the lawsuit makes a variation on an argument that courts have repeatedly rejected -- that teaching evolution in itself is teaching a religious idea.
``The courts in many cases have said evolution is a scientific idea and there is no prohibition on the government teaching a scientific idea even if it conflicts'' with some people's religious beliefs, said university counsel Christopher Patti.
Larry Caldwell, who has two children in Roseville schools, also has sued administrators in the Roseville Joint Union High School District in an evolution-related controversy. The suit stems from his efforts -- which he says were frustrated by the district -- to persuade the school board to give students material challenging Charles Darwin's theory of evolution. The Pacific Justice Institute, a Sacramento non-profit that focuses on religious freedom and parental rights, has joined Caldwell in preparing both lawsuits.
``I think we ought to be honest with students about what the scientific data shows about evolution,'' Caldwell said. ``Clearly students need to be taught about theory of evolution.
``But what we say is that it's not that cut and dried from the fossil record. The fossil data leave unanswered questions about large-scale evolution. The record shows us what fossils existed but can't tell us about how they got there.''
Scientists respond that while the fossil record continues to be studied and interpreted, it provides solid evidence of evolution. Beyond the fossil record, research in the past 25 years from molecular biology, genetics, cell biology and embryology have added further evidence for evolution.
The Understanding Evolution site was funded with a National Science Foundation grant awarded in 2001 and it went live in September 2004. The site grew out of a national conference hosted by the Museum of Paleontology in 2000 on teaching evolution, which was increasingly coming under attack. A theme that emerged from the conference was the need for better teaching material.
The site was developed to provide teachers with up-to-date content and lessons and aid them in responding to students' questions, said Judy Scotchmoor, the museum's assistant director of education and public programs and a science teacher for 25 years.
``Teachers wanted access to material that would increase their confidence,'' Scotchmoor said. The lawsuit has struck a strong chord among scientists who supported the site's development.
``It is all part of a climate of hostility toward the teaching of evolution,'' said Glenn Branch, deputy director of the National Center for Science Education, an Oakland-based organization that helped to develop the site.
``Sometimes it is clear and overt,'' such as when lawsuits are filed, he said. ``But often it is more subtle, such as when teachers feel pressure from students or parents to play down, omit or compromise the teaching of evolution.''
Bigger issue
Roy Caldwell, director of the Museum of Paleontology and a professor of integrative biology at UC-Berkeley, sees a larger problem: ``The thing that disturbs me the most is that this is not just an attack on evolution; it's an attack on science.''
Besides Roy Caldwell (who is not related to Jeanne and Larry Caldwell), the suit names as defendants David Lindberg, museum curator and chairman of UC-Berkeley's integrative biology department, and Michael Piburn, program director for the National Science Foundation.
In a national survey of 1,000 teachers last spring, the National Science Teachers Association found that 31 percent of those who responded said they feel pressured to include creationism, intelligent design or other non-scientific alternatives to evolution in their science classroom. Teachers said most of the pressure is coming from students and parents.
That rings true for Kevin Scully, a biology teacher at Pioneer High School in San Jose. Scully, who has recently begun to use the Understanding Evolution Web site, said it ``gives teachers a simple but effective explanation of how evolution works and why we know that evolution does in fact occur. And it's from a reputable source.''
He said some high school biology teachers shy away from teaching evolution ``because teachers don't want to get into the controversy'' or become ``targets.''
``Often a teacher is afraid to accept that students have differing opinions about whether or not evolution occurred,'' Scully said, ``or they are afraid to answer questions.'' What he tells his students about evolution, he said, is ``you don't have to believe it yourself to understand it. Belief is not what we teach at school; what we teach is evidence and accepted hypotheses, theories and laws.''
