November 10, 2008
Filed under:
The Arts — Crevo Press @ 9:59 am
A new perspective on an old debate
by Colin Dabkowski (Arts & Entertainment)
The Buffalo News, p. C5
November 8, 2008
As literary nonfiction, the time surrounding the publication of Charles Darwin’s “The Origin of Species” surely makes for one of the most engrossing debates between religion and science in history.
As dramatic quasi-fiction, however, it loses quite a bit of its punch. That’s what we’re dealing with in Alleyway Theatre’s “Tromping on Sacred Ground,” a tightly written and well-constructed look at the fraught atmosphere in mid-19th century England, when Darwin’s divisive treatise had just come out and the entire country was embroiled in a crisis of conscience over the antibiblical nature of his work.
The show, winner of Alleyway’s annual Maxim Mazumdar New Play Competition, is by playwright Suzanne C. Dickie, a retired professor of philosophy at Loyola University in Chicago. It centers around the British scientist Thomas Henry Huxley (Casey Denton), a vociferous exponent of Darwin’s work, and the debates — both personal and public — in which he engaged to defend the supremacy of science over religion. Dickie has fluidly transposed the public confrontations to Huxley’s personal life, in which the power of religion still has a firm grasp over his intellectually curious wife, Nettie (Kelly Beuth). Huxley is supported in his support, as it were, by fellow scientist John Tyndall (Christopher S. Parada) and vexed by the clerical assertions of Bishop Samuel Wilberforce (Dennis Keefe).
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This was also reported in at least three other UK newspapers: The Daily Telegraph, The Herald, and The Journal.
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Creationism should be taught as science, say 29% of teachers
by James Randerson
The Guardian (UK), p. 16
November 7, 2008
Twenty-nine per cent of teachers believe that creationism and intelligent design should be taught as science, according to an online survey of attitudes to teaching evolution in the UK. Nearly 50% of the respondents said they believed that excluding alternatives to evolution was counter-productive and would alienate pupils from science.
The survey, by the website and TV station Teachers TV, also found strong support for the views of Prof Michael Reiss, the former director of education at the Royal Society, who resigned in September over comments about including creationism in science lessons.
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October 31, 2008
‘Darwin? That’s just the party line’
by Wayne Eyre
National Post (Canada), p. A17
October 31, 2008
We’re all familiar with Queen Gertrude’s dry observation in Act III of Hamlet that the Player Queen “doth protest too much.” Gertrude’s point, of course, is that the Player Queen’s over-insistence of her love for her husband makes her declarations highly suspect.
I often think of Gertrude’s line when I see how vehemently many A-list scientists and fellow-travelling literati lash out at anyone who does not embrace their insistence that no deity is behind either the creation of our universe or plant and animal origins on Earth.
For example, Richard Dawkins, author of The God Delusion, says that anyone who doesn’t believe in evolution “is ignorant, stupid or insane.” Oxford professor Peter Atkins, another ardent atheist, recently denounced theology, poetry and philosophy and concluded that “scientists are at the summit of knowledge, beacons of rationality and intellectually honest.”
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October 28, 2008
Dawkins’s warning on fairy tales to children
by Martin Beckford and Urmee Khan
The Daily Telegraph (UK), p. 2
October 25, 2008
Professor Richard Dawkins, the prominent atheist, is to write a book aimed at children in which he will warn them against believing in fairy tales as well as God.
The evolutionary biologist is stepping down from his post at Oxford University and will instead research whether “anti-scientific” novels about spells and wizards such as the Harry Potter series have a “pernicious effect” on young minds.
Prof Dawkins, the author of best-selling The God Delusion who this week agreed to fund a series of atheist adverts on London buses, said his new book would also set out to demolish the “Judeo-Christian myth”.
“The book I write next year will be a children’s book on how to think about the world — science thinking contrasted with mythical thinking,” he told Channel 4.
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Board’s actions could put students at a disadvantage
by Alan I. Leshner
The Houston Chronicle, p. B9
October 23, 2008
Texas has earned a reputation as an innovation powerhouse in fields ranging from agriculture and life sciences to high technology and space exploration.
But in a report issued this summer, a panel of Texas business, education and government leaders warned that without “critical changes” in state schools — especially in science-related instruction — the state will lose its global competitive edge.
It appears, however, that some members of the State Board of Education are working on a different agenda. Last week, they appointed three anti-evolution activists, including a leader of the “intelligent design” religious campaign, to a six-member panel that will review proposed new science curriculum standards.
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