Creationist Questions Answered by Scientists

Hello All,

SB 733, the “LA Science Education Act,” has passed in Louisiana and represents a gateway for creationist literature, etc. into science classrooms.  Read about it at http://lasciencecoalition.org/

There seems to be quite a bit of creationist propaganda in the form of questions critical of evolution designed for students to take to class. Many of these questions are specific to text books. Thus, even classes with responsible teachers can be bombarded with creationist nonsense through misguided students.

If you check out http://textaddons.com/ they have a great list of questions for teachers to ask their students under "What Is Your Evolution I.Q.?" Some of these questions are legitimate, while many are seeded with creationist language (random, information), incorrect questions, deliberately misleading, etc.

Certainly more sites exist with "Questions about evolution", etc. It would be nice to build a list of these and try to answer the most common questions. Here is a very short list.

I propose that we (collective we) answer these questions. They are very straightforward and I think it would be of great benefit to Louisiana teachers, students, citizens, etc. if they had good answers.

Teachers are overworked as it is, and they need all the help they can get. At minimum a website with an answer to every question that they could refer the students to would be great!

Additionally, let’s not sell the students short: 1) Students themselves would use this resource to counter creationist students, 2) People do not emerge from the womb with fixed beliefs and a correct confident answer from a teacher to a seemingly impossible question WILL have impact. 

Conceivably a project could arise involving:

1. A resources website with answers to questions

2. Available Power Point presentations/individual slides answering questions, and/or explaining contestable language (random, information, macroevolution, perfect, etc.)

3. A real print book, specifically designed to answer questions AND show that these questions have been answered, are bad questions, are deliberately misleading, etc. It might also show that at least some people in Louisiana are trying to make the state a better place.

This could be done “on the cheap” with a group of 4 or 5 people willing to answer the questions, provide introductory material concerning science, evolution, our place in the universe, maybe a chapter “The Evolution of Creationism”, how evolutionary thought and study affects our lives (and economy!), etc. We could simply share chapters via email to be critiqued, etc.

It seems that if we coordinated with the National Center for Science Education http://www.natcenscied.org/ and Barbara Forrest at Louisiana Coalition for Science http://lasciencecoalition.org/ we might be able to pull from their expertise and gain legitimacy.

Email me, Michael Ferro if you’re interested.  spongymesophyllATgmail.com (replace AT with @)