Dover Monkey Trials

Below you will find the original script of the Dover school board’s Intelligent Design statement read in schools, and below that the judges ruling on the matter.

The Pennsylvania Academic Standards require students to learn about Darwin’s Theory of Evolution and eventually to take a standardized test of which evolution is a part.

Because Darwin’s Theory is a theory, it continues to be tested as new evidence is discovered. The Theory is not a fact. Gaps in the Theory exist for which there is no evidence. A theory is defined as a well-tested explanation that unifies a broad range of observations.

Intelligent Design is an explanation of the origin of life that differs from Darwin’s view. The reference book, Of Pandas and People, is available for students who might be interested in gaining an understanding of what Intelligent Design actually involves.

With respect to any theory, students are encouraged to keep an open mind. The school leaves the discussion of the Origins of Life to individual students and their families. As a Standards-driven district, class instruction focuses upon preparing students to achieve proficiency on Standards-based assessments.

my favorite part is when it comes out that the On Pandas and People, the supposed ID text book turnes out to have been creationist text book that they just global search and replaced the word creationist with ID. Ha ha.

As Plaintiffs meticulously and effectively presented to the Court, Pandas
went through many drafts, several of which were completed prior to and some after
the Supreme Court’s decision in Edwards, which held that the Constitution forbids
teaching creationism as science. By comparing the pre and post Edwards drafts of
Pandas, three astonishing points emerge: (1) the definition for creation science in
early drafts is identical to the definition of ID; (2) cognates of the word creation
(creationism and creationist), which appeared approximately 150 times were
deliberately and systematically replaced with the phrase ID; and (3) the changes
occurred shortly after the Supreme Court held that creation science is religious and
cannot be taught in public school science classes in Edwards. This word
substitution is telling, significant, and reveals that a purposeful change of words
was effected without any corresponding change in content, which directly refutes
FTE’s argument that by merely disregarding the words “creation” and
“creationism,” FTE expressly rejected creationism in Pandas.

read the whole 139 page report here

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