The cover of Time magazine’s latest edition was devoted to “Evolution’s Big Bang”, writes Tim Cornwell. It reported mounting fossil evidence that 543 million years ago an achingly slow process of evolution ended when a horde of multi-cellular creatures with teeth, claws and jaws, sprouted out all over the Earth.
It promises just one more headache for secondary biology students in Alabama. Already their textbooks are to carry the Darwinian equivalent of a government health warning. The state textbook committee, under pressure from religious conservatives, this month approved an insert to be pasted on the inside cover of classroom biology books. The insert will remind students that evolution is just a theory, and that nothing is proven about the origin of life.
Crowds gathered for a day-long meeting of the committee and cheered when Fob James, the Alabama governor, did a sarcastic on-stage imitation of how an ape changes into man, dragging his hands on the floor as he lumbered across the room.
This year’s local elections saw a push for creationism teaching among some candidates for school boards, particularly in Southern states. Creationists, who believe that God literally created the world, are included in the ranks of the religious Right, which is regarded as a powerful force in the Republican party.
Governor James, who argued for the insert, said: “I think people came from God, Adam and Eve. Everybody ought to know that.”
