A creationist group my soon offer master's degrees in science
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Transcript of today's show:
In Texas, the Institute for Creation Research has won initial approval to offer accredited master’s degrees in science education. Science education groups are angry that none of the approval board's vote-casting members are professionally trained in science. Even more upsetting is the fact that the master's degree program will train future teachers in creation science. Texans will have the final vote in January.
[source: The Dallas Morning News]
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Background Facts: The Institute for Creation Research
Offices: In Dallas, TX and Santee, Calif.
Annual budget: $7 million
Faculty members: four full time
Students: more than 50
Degrees: master of science degree in science education with minors in astro/geophysics, biology, geology and general science.
School: The institute runs its own graduate school that offers master's of science education degrees. Its stated mission: to "research, educate and communicate Truth involving the study and promotion of scientific creationism, Biblical creationism, and related fields."
The Institute for Creation Research Graduate School sets out its educational philosophy and beliefs on its Web site, www.icr.org.
On its philosophy: The institute says its administration and faculty are "committed to the tenets of both scientific creationism and Biblical creationism." It says the two "are compatible ... and all genuine facts of science support the Bible."
On public schools: The institute "maintains that scientific creationism should be taught along with the scientific aspects of evolutionism in tax-supported institutions."
SOME TENETS OF SCIENTIFIC CREATIONISM
•The physical universe "was supernaturally created by a transcendent personal Creator who alone has existed from eternity."
•Life "was specially and supernaturally created by the Creator."
•All plants and animals were "created functionally complete from the beginning and did not evolve from some other kind of organism."
•Evolution since creation is "limited to 'horizontal' changes (variations) within the kinds, or 'downward' changes (e.g., harmful mutations, extinctions).
•Humans "were specially created in fully human form from the start."
SOME TENETS OF BIBLICAL CREATIONISM
•The creator of the universe is a triune God: Father, Son and Holy Spirit.
•The universe was created "in the six literal days of the Creation Week" described in Genesis.
•All human beings descended from Adam and Eve.
Eugenie Scott of the National Center for Science Education:
They teach distorted science ... Any student coming out from the ICR with a degree in science would not be competent to teach in Texas public schools.
from Josh Harkinson at Mother Jones blog:
Because Baylor University is not doing enough to plumb the seas for Noah's Ark, an advisory committee of the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board has recommended that the Institute for Creation Research be given the authority to grant Master's degrees in science education. Perhaps the training will help graduates stay employed in the Lone Star State, rather than getting fired like the state's former director of science curricula, a shameless Darwin booster.
Is Texas devolving? Not at all. According to the Institute's mission statement, it will only enroll the self-motivated, responsible student who "is more self-disciplined ('whether therefore ye eat, or drink, or whatever ye do, do all to the glory of God;' I Cor. 10:31) and takes education seriously ('And whatsoever ye do, do it heartily, as to the Lord, and not unto men;' Colossians 3:23)."
The Texas Observer reports that the same guys brought us the Creation Museum in Kentucky (see Adam frolic with the dinosaurs!), and are at work stumping for Mike Huckabee in Iowa.
