Friday, October 14, 2005

 

Mo. Rep. Cynthia Davis to Re-introduce Antiscience Legislation

Missouri State Rep. Cynthia Davis -- she's Missouri's answer to Connie Morris -- plans to reintroduce a bill in the Missouri Legislature to require all biology textbooks sold to the public schools in the state of Missouri to have one chapter containing a "critical analysis of origins."

What does Davis mean by critical analysis? Here's a clue:

The bill, says Davis, would allow students to "learn about science without the influence of those who are hostile toward God. The purpose of the biology class is to learn about science, not how we could have created ourselves as if atheism were the only option."

Davis, like our own Connie Morris, is a devout Christian fundamentalist who believes that teaching evolution in public schools will inevitably lead to corruption of public morals. Interestingly, despite their deep religious convictions and activism, both are have been found to be ethically challenged.

Morris was caught padding her expense report following a trip to Florida, and Davis dipped into her election campaign war chest to pay property taxes on her Jefferson City home. Both were forced to repay the money.

Both are fiscal conservatives who believe too much of the taxpayer's money is spent on educating school children, neither has demonstrated much compunction about dipping into other people's money when it would benefit them.

Here's a link to a story by Bob Noce in the Columbia Missourian that details Davis' plans to reintroduce her "teach the controversy" bill -- it died in the last session of the legislature. For students of this sort of thing, the article also provides an interesting rundown of evolution education in Columbia's private and public schools.

Here is a link to a pdf on Davis' website titled, "Discussion of Origins" that outlines her views.

It will be interesting to see how Davis' bill fares this session of the legislature now that Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich has extended an invitation to scientists at some of Missouri's leading scientific institutions -- including Washington University, St. Louis Children's Hospital, the Academy of Science for St. Louis and a number of universities and hospitals in the Kansas City area -- to relocate to Illinois to conduct stem cell research there.

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