Tuesday, March 27, 2012

Tenn. governor gets bill backed by skeptics of evolution and climate change

Tennessee Gov. Bill Haslam is set to sign a controversial bill that would allow open discussion in elementary and high school classrooms of alternative theories to evolution and climate change and "declares that teachers cannot be disciplined for permitting such discussions," reports Tom Humphrey of the Knoxville News-Sentinel.

If Haslam signs the bill, Tennessee will become the fourth state to have such laws on the books. Haslam, a former mayor of Knoxville, said he knew little about the bill and was going to ask state Board of Education officials about the details. The bill was originally passed out of the state's House last year, but amended in the Senate and sent back to the House.

Sponsors say the bill encourages "critical thinking skills" in students, but several groups have openly opposed passage of the bill, including American Association for the Advancement of Science, the Tennessee Science Teachers Association, the National Association of Biology Teachers, the National Association of Geoscience Teachers, and the National Earth Science Teachers Association. (Read more)

Brian Merchant of TreeHugger, an environmental blog, said the climate-change aspects of the bill were written by the conservative American Legislative Exchange Council, which holds meetings for state legislators and lobbyists and is supported by fossil-fuel energy companies. The Center for Media and Democracy found more than 800 bills and resolutions in several states written by ALEC.

Meanwhile, "The world is close to reaching tipping points that will make it irreversibly hotter, making this decade critical in efforts to contain global warming, scientists warned on Monday." So reports Nina Chestney for PlanetArk, quoting Will Steffen, executive director of the Australian National University's climate change institute, who spoke at a conference in London: "This is the critical decade. If we don't get the curves turned around this decade we will cross those lines." (Read more)

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