Ignorance in Kansas

So, the Kansas Board of Education made ignorance official state policy yesterday. And before you start thinking that I, of all people, am against the free exchange of ideas, think again. I relish the introduction of Intelligent Design, (and let’s not lie about it – ID means Creationism), into the debate. My only problem is that the ignorant folks in charge of our kids’ education (who needs education? China and India going to take over anyway, right?) want to have this debate in Science class. Not in comparative religions or philosophy or somewhere relevant, but in a Science setting.

Hello, in case no one has told you this, intelligent design is a theory, but it’s NOT A SCIENTIFIC THEORY. I can’t believe that otherwise seemingly intelligent folks fail to make this very simple distinction. I’ll stop now, as I won’t turn this into a debate about the merits of intelligent design; my problem is that we are failing to make key distinctions between science and faith, and our children will be the ones to suffer for the ignorance of a few.

This is probably a good a time as any to introduce folks to this alternative theory of Intelligent Design (not for the humor-impaired). One of the things you will learn at the aforementioned site is that “there is a statistically significant inverse relationship between pirates and global temperature.”

Update: there’s one good thing about this decision. We no longer have to worry about bird flu here in Kansas. Since there’s no evolution, the current flu virus can’t evolve into a more dangerous form of flu. And aren’t we all glad for that!

Update 2: Even the Vatican has chimed in on this debate, noting that “… we also know the dangers of a religion that severs its links with reason and becomes prey to fundamentalism …”