Should Creationism be taught in schools alongside Evolution?

by vdshjffjdhgdfh (student)

GCSE Religious Studies (Philosophy & Ethics)

Should Creationism be taught in schools

alongside Evolution

Throughout the world, there is a debate over whether the theory of evolution should be taught alongside the stories of Creation. In some states of America, Christian fundamentalists have succeeded in having the theory of evolution banned from schools and colleges. This shows how far people to get what they believe is right.

There are two Creation stories; the P source, and the J source. The P source tells us the story of how God made the world in six days whereas the J source shows God in a more hands on approach (in comparison to him creating things by commanding it to be so). It tells the story of how God created Adam out of dust, and Eve out of one of Adam’s ribs. They are put together in the Garden of Eden.

The story of creation is the most popular story as evolution does appears to remove the need for a God in the process of the creation of life.. People who are religious, (who believe in God) feel that they cannot believe the theory of evolution when it contradicts the story told by sources P and J.

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It does have some weaknesses though. It does not explain the presence of fossils or the geological evidence against this story. So called Creationists dismiss this because God may have ‘panted’ the rocks as a test of faith.

Those who believe in the story of Creation are known as Creationists. There are two main types of Creationists; conservative and progressive. Conservative Creationists believe that the Genesis story is to be interpreted in a strictly liberal way. Progressive Creationists take a more liberal interpretation of the Genesis account. They feel that they can accommodate the fossil record through this interpretation. For example, the word ‘day’ in Genesis 1 is taken to refer to a more general period of time rather that 24 hours.

During Charles Darwin’s famous expedition to the Galapagos Islands in 1839, Darwin noted that there were variations between animals on each island. Each group of animals appeared to have adapted to the conditions on their island. Darwin devised his theory of evolution to explain how these variations could have come about.

This was a strong theory because it is backed up scientific evidence. It is widely known that animals adapt to their specific surroundings. It also explained something that before was just not known. There are also fossils that back this theory up.

As with any theory, it has its sceptics. There are many natural phenomenon such as cleaner fish that evolution cannot explain. Cleaner fish are fish that swim into larger fishes mouths and clean parasites and pieces of food out of their mouths. Instead of the larger fishes eating the small fish, we wait calmly, and when finished they swim off to eat other small fish. Why would a little fish want to swim into the mouth of a big fish which usually eats little fish. This suggests that someone Godlike designed these fish to work together in this way. Also some people think there is a fatal flaw in his findings. He said that all living things evolved over many millions of years from the same ancestor, a tiny cell in the ocean. Because, although we can see many differences in the world of nature what we never see is any type of living thing changing into something completely different. Darwin himself admitted there was no evidence for such big changes.

Many scientists believe in this theory of evolution as it is commonly seen that animals can adapt. Also, Richard Dawkins created a new strain of Darwinism namely Neo-Darwinism. This introduces the concept of random genetic mutation either giving some advantage to the organism or not effecting the organism.

Based from this evidence above, I think that Creationism should be taught alongside evolution as evolution is only a theory and children should not be forced into what to believe but choose themselves. Scientists are happy to work alongside the story of Creation so, even if you don’t believe in evolution, there is no reason why it should not be taught in schools. Obviously, if parents felt strongly, they should be able to withdraw their children from those lessons.