Science Is Constantly Evolving

Discover the latest in climate change and evolution education news.

On December 20, 2005, the decision (139-page PDF) in Kitzmiller v. Dover was issued, and the plaintiffs triumphed. In his 139-page decision, Judge John E. Jones III concluded, "The proper application of both the endorsement and Lemon tests to the facts of this case makes it abundantly…
Writing in the Washington Post (December 17, 2005) on the topic of what "intelligent design" textbooks would actually teach, Douglas Baynton discusses textbooks from the nineteenth century. "The one science course routinely taught in elementary schools back then was geography," he writes…
Oral arguments in the appeal in Selman v. Cobb County were heard by a three-judge panel in the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals in Atlanta, Georgia, on December 15, 2005. At issue is a decision issued by a lower court in January 2005, holding that the policy requiring evolution warning…
In a statement released on December 6, 2005, the National Council of Jewish Women expressed its opposition to "the current campaign to add intelligent design to public school curricula and classrooms and to denigrate the teaching of evolution." NCJW is a volunteer organization, inspired by Jewish…
Three news stories published on December 11, two in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, and one in the Washington Post, highlight the case Selman et al v. Cobb County School District and Board of Education. The appeal in the lawsuit over anti-evolution warning labels formerly…
by Nick Matzke In the print edition of the December 5, 2005, edition of The New Yorker, Margaret Talbot has a long, excellent writeup of the six-week Kitzmiller trial. She successfully captures the drama, the science, the legal high-points, and the general all-around American-ness…
by Nick Matzke All of the available post-trial filings in Kitzmiller v. Dover are now uploaded onto NCSE's KvD website. These include the Plaintiffs' and Defendants' Findings of Fact and Conclusions of Law, the Plaintiffs' Response to the Defendants' Findings, the
The Thomas B. Fordham Institute's report The State of State Science Standards -- the first comprehensive review of state science standards since 2000 -- was released on December 7, 2005. According to the Fordham Institute's description: Science education in America is under…
Writing on the space.com website (December 1, 2005), Seth Shostak of the SETI Institute debunks a common claim of the "intelligent design" movement: that "intelligent design" uses the same methodology, and thus is as scientifically credible, as the search for extraterrestrial intelligence.…