Disclaimers in Science Texts

* Re “OK in Church but Not in the Schools,” editorial, Dec. 10:

I have to take issue with you regarding your presumption that the theory of evolution and natural selection is established scientific fact, no longer subject to scientific debate and experiment. The questions that remain unresolved are not the details of the fossil record but rather the idea that all of the diverse and complex life on Earth developed from simple proteins in a primordial soup through a process of random reactions, mutations and natural selection. This has certainly not been proven by scientific experiment and your misunderstanding of this point shows exactly why we need to include the asterisk in our schoolbooks when it comes to teaching the theory of evolution and natural selection.

While I don’t recommend that we teach the biblical story of creation in the public schools, at least not in science class, it’s obvious that your dogmatic, scientific-humanistic worldview prevails and is woefully out of balance. So, it’s back to school for the editors of The Times! And while you’re there you might want to take a quick look at the 2nd Law of Thermodynamics, or better yet, check your teenager’s room for order or chaos!

MATT GORDER

Riverside

* Hearty applause for your editorial. Granted, I live in a fairly progressive community, but I am a high school student at a public school and to hear serious cries for a creationism revival is a gross affront to my dignity.

As a philosophical document, the Bible is very important, but it no longer needs to be interpreted as a literal history of the world. An education without religion is an unbiased education. It does not drive students away from God, but it does prepare them for life in a modern (and scientific) world.

DANIEL DeSELM

Irvine

* The Times is correct that Alabama schoolchildren will “have their educations crippled . . . by outdated, erroneous ideas.” Yet even more disturbing is that often the agenda of advocates of this type of disclaimer is far broader than a belief in creationism; it is to dismantle the wall of church-state separation brick by brick.

The Anti-Defamation League routinely receives complaints from students and their parents about holiday programs which contain only devotional hymns, religious student clubs that are obviously the brainchild of the local minister, not of the students (as required by the Equal Access Act) and other violations of the constitutionally mandated separation of church and state.

In this environment, actions like that taken by a government agency in Alabama, should serve as a red flag that there exists a well-organized movement at the grass-roots level to undermine the Constitution’s guarantees. Groups have sought not only to teach creationism in place of evolution, but to introduce mandatory prayer in schools and to remove classic American novels from school libraries for often questionable reasons.

Californians should sit up and take notice because a close look at the political climate in our state suggests that efforts at rewriting our texts many not be far off.

TZIVIA SCHWARTZ

Western States Counsel

ADL, Los Angeles