READERS RESPOND -- Last round of the debate over creationism in

public schools

Who’s that lurking by the back door of the schoolhouse? It’s Wendy Leece!

She’s put white lab coats on the religious icons from her church and is

trying to sneak them into school disguised as science teachers

(figuratively speaking, of course).

Leece, in her letter (“Educators should be able to challenge evolutionary

theory,” Jan. 11), fails to respond to any of the points I made in my

prior letter (“Creationism should not be taught as a science,” Jan. 9).

Instead of a reasoned response to my defense of teaching about evolution

in our public schools, Leece has fired off a barrage of unsupported

assertions and incoherent word strings. “Fossils, peppered moths, the

Cambrian explosion” . . . Boom! Take that, Egan!

I started out to respond as though her letter were a rational discussion.

I first wrote an explanation of what the words she used mean and why the

matters she referred to don’t lessen the validity of the theory of

evolution and, in the case of fossils, actually are a main support of the

theory. In my response, I also discussed the proper roles of science and

faith, and the confusion that results from attempting to make either one

do the work of the other. I refuted each of her assertions. However, it

took about 2,500 words, too long for a letter to the editor. Then I

realized there’s no point in using reason to address ranting.

The question really is not whether our present understanding of the

natural history of today’s species is complete. Rather, the question is

whether public school science courses should teach about nature or the

supernatural; should they teach about the scientific method or faith?

Any family who wants their child’s school to teach religion is free to

send their child to a religious school. Otherwise, their child can attend

a public school to learn about the world we share with other people and

cultures. For religious instruction, their child can go to a church,

chapel, meeting house, temple, synagogue, mosque or ashram. A public

school is not a proper place to proselytize or indoctrinate children in

religion.

If we take Leece’s advice and have our public schools teach religion

instead of science, and then turn our children out into the high-tech

world of the 21st century, God help them!

ELEANOR EGAN

Costa Mesa

I met Wendy Leece in the early 1980s when our children attended the same

elementary school. She impressed me as a woman of veracity, honor and

integrity, then and now.

I feel very comfortable with her viewpoints on education, i.e. teaching a

well-rounded perspective of creation and evolution, and teaching

abstinence with safe-sex practices. She valiantly represents our children

and the current issues that face them daily in school. Her wholesome

values should not be considered aberrant and rebuked by the school board.

It takes courage to be different and adhere to one’s beliefs in spite of

what others suggest or expect.

I congratulate Wendy on being the dynamic leader that she is and feel

very fortunate to know her.

KATHLEEN MAHAN

Costa Mesa

Religion has a place in everyone’s life; however, public school is not

the place for it to be taught. If parents want their children to be

taught religion along with the basic three Rs, there are any number of

church-affiliated schools that they can send their children to. If

religion is taught or brought into the public school system, what

religion will it be? Christian? What about the children who are not

Christian? What about the children who are Jewish, Muslim, Buddhist,

Hindu? Who will determine what religion is brought in, and what lessons

from which religion should be taught? As far as what to teach children

about the origins of life, give them all the theories and let them know

that they are only theories and that no one, at this point in time,

really knows how the origin of our species came about. Let them, along

with their parents and their individual religious choices, decide which

theory they are comfortable with. Let the children broaden their minds by

exploring within themselves what they believe. Isn’t education after all

about helping a child broaden their mind using all the information

available to them?

SUSAN SPIEGELMAN

Fountain Valley

I am shocked and dismayed to read Wendy Leece’s impassioned plea for the

teaching of “intelligent design” in our classrooms. Despite her protests,

intelligent design is indeed just a code word for creationism -- an

attempt to sneak the Creator in through the backdoor of our classrooms,

disguised in a pair of Groucho Marx glasses.

Leece cites Michael Behe’s book and the Discovery Institute Web site in

support of her claim, rather than a recognized and accepted scientific

journal. Her questionable citations demonstrate the paucity of her

argument. Behe’s “irreducible complexity” argument hasn’t been censored

or ignored by biased scientists, it has simply been exposed and discarded

for the claptrap that it is (for one such examination of Behe’s argument,

see “Tower of Babel: The Evidence Against the New Creationism” by Robert

T. Pennock). It is not bias or censorship of opposing views to refuse to

put crackpot flat-Earth theories on an equal basis with recognized

scientific thought.

To tell students that events sometimes happen outside of the established

laws of nature sounds more like a job for Jean Dixon than for a teacher

in our schools. Shame on Leece for advocating such nonsense in the

classroom.

THOMAS DOBRZENIECKI

Costa Mesa