Thoughts in a Haystack

[P]rotestations often come from both creation-science and ID proponents that they are not trying to remove evolution from the classroom. They claim that they merely want to give students "all the evidence" or "the complete range of scientific theories" -- which, of course, in practice includes giving them creation science and/or ID along with evolution. But given their view that evolution is evil in and of itself, or at best a stalking horse for philosophical materialism, it is difficult to take such pronouncements at face value. I believe that creation-science and ID proponents deliberately avoid trying to ban evolution because they know such approaches are illegal (as in the 1968 Supreme Court case Epperson v. Arkansas). They also are savvy enough to realize that the public equates efforts to ban evolution with backwardness: the state or community that attempts to do so becomes a source of ridicule in editorial cartoons and late-night talk shows, as did Kansas in 1999 when its state board of education attempted to remove evolution from the state science education standards. A strategy promoting inclusion of alternatives to evolution is far more publicly palatable.

- Eugenie C. Scott, "Creation Science Lite: 'Intelligent Design' as the New Anti-Evolutionism," Scientists Confront Creationism: Intelligent Design and Beyond, Andrew J. Petto and Laurie R. Godfrey, eds., 2007