How Religion and Science Interact and the Issue of Evolution

A featured speaker at Westminster College’s 2012 Symposium on Religious Experience in a Global Society, Dr. Eugenie Scott, Executive Director of the National Center for Science Education (Oakland, California), discusses religion, science and evolution. Almost 80 years after the Scopes trial, the debate over the teaching of evolution continues to rage. There is no easy resolution—It is a complex topic with profound scientific, religious, educational, and legal implications. Dr. Scott discusses the nature of the evolution-creationism debate and the important religious and scientific aspects of the conflict and argues that evolution must be the foundation of scientific inquiry in the United States today.

Dr. Scott, a former university professor, has been both a researcher and an activist in the creationism/evolution controversy for more than 25 years and has addressed many components of this controversy, including educational, legal, scientific, religious, and social issues. She holds eight honorary degrees, from McGill, Rutgers, Mt. Holyoke, the University of New Mexico, Ohio State, the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, Colorado College, and the University of Missouri-Columbia. Scott is the author of Evolution vs. Creationism and co-editor, with Glenn Branch, of Not in Our Classrooms: Why Intelligent Design Is Wrong for Our Schools.

You’ll recall when Pennsylvania House Republican Leader Mike Turzai was filmed admitting that the voter ID law he ushered in for that state was designed to make sure Obama lost there to Mitt Romney (see below). Pennsylvania is sort of a swing state, but Obama winning there would not have shocked anyone even from the perspective of a few months ago before Romney started “running” for president (and by “running” I mean “stumbling”). Since then, all three states that have voter ID laws in place to bias the election towards Republican candidates have seen a backlash against this atrocious insult to our democracy, and as a result, Obama will win in all three of those states, and other Democrats will do well.

And now, this: Judge Puts Pennsylvania Voter ID Law On Hold Through Election. From NPR:

A judge is basically “postponing Pennsylvania’s tough new voter identification requirement, ordering that it not be enforced in the presidential election,” The Associated Press writes.

But in a ruling that’s rather difficult to follow if you’re not very familiar with the case, Commonwealth Court Judge Robert Simpson also says he “will not restrain election officials from asking for photo ID at the polls; rather, I will enjoin enforcement of those parts of Act 18 which directly result in disenfranchisement.”

I look forward to expert commentary that will help us all understand this.