Should Creationism be Taught at School?
Over the past decade, there has been an intense war on whether schools should teach creationism to explain how the Earth was created. Creationism is supported by many conservative christians and often times they demand that creationism be taught along with evolution to explain the beginnings of the world. However, creationism has no place in the science classrooms. It belongs outside of school.
According to the Merriam Webster Dictionary, creationism is defined as “the belief that God created all things out of nothing as described in the Bible.” Evolution is defined as “a theory that the differences between modern plants and animals are because of changes that happened by a natural process over a very long time.” Creationism is a belief that was written down by man thousands of years ago. There is no scientific evidence that this belief actually happened. Evolution is a theory that explains that over a long period of time animals began to adapt and evolve, which eventually led to the animals today. Many people may argue that evolution is just a theory and shouldn’t be taught as fact. However, there is a different meaning for theory in the scientific community. A scientific theory is a well-supported and widely accepted explanation of the way nature works. It’s supported by large amounts of evidence and is often accepted as the truth. Also, people argue that the Holy Bible is evidence for creationism. However, as said before, this book was written by a variety of people and probably changed as well. According to this logic, I can pick up the mythological story of Arachne and Athena and say, “Because it is written down in a short story, spiders definitely descended from Arachne.”
Another point that should be brought up is separation of state and church. Just as there is a right to freedom of religion, that also applies to freedom from religion. Religion has no place
on school grounds as schools educate people of different backgrounds and beliefs. It’s important to understand that teaching creationism would violate the right of freedom of/from religion. Evolution is not a religion created by atheists. It’s a scientific explanation that outlines how life came about, not another belief.
I feel very strongly about this topic because I feel it is a student’s right to be presented with the accurate information and be taught how it works, as well as not allowing religion get clumped with science. Creationism is a belief that should be taught at Sunday School, not our biology classrooms.
