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Is Evolution "Just a Theory"?

by Edward J. Larson

Mr. Larson is the Russell Professor of History and Talmadge Professor of Law at the University of Georgia. Among his recent books are Trial and Error: The American Controversy Over Creation and Evolution, 3rd ed. (Oxford University Press, 2003) and Evolution: The Remarkable History of a Scientific Theory (Modern Library, 2004).

"Evolution is just a theory," is the refrain heard in countless conservative Christian churches. "It is guesses strung together," orator William Jennings Bryan liked to say during America's first anti-evolution crusade in the 1920s. The refrain continues today.

Within America's growing conservative Christian subculture, best selling authors on scientific topics repeat the refrain. Creationist Henry Morris revived it with co-author John Whitcomb in their still popular 1961 book, The Genesis Flood, and repeated it in scores of books, articles, and lectures over the ensuing decades. He founded the Institute for Creation Research to promote his view that scientific evidence supports the Genesis account of special creation over the Darwinian theory of evolution. University of California law professor Phillip Johnson took up the theme in his 1991 book, Darwin on Trial. Unlike Morris, Johnson does not offer an alternative to evolution theory. Instead, he focuses his legal skills on making case against Darwinism. It's just a theory to Morris and Johnson, and not a very good one.

Turn on Christian broadcasting -- that all-enveloping net of radio and television enveloping conservative Christians in modern America -- and you will hear Morris's message popularized in Ken Ham's Answers in Genesis and Johnson's thoughts echoed on Chuck Colson's "Breakpoint" and James Dobson's "Focus on the Family." These daily radio programs reach millions of households on hundreds of stations in every state of the union.

Add to this tapes, videos, children's books, sermons, Sunday school classes, Christian schools and even Christian theme parks reinforcing the refrain, and one can hardly blame Americans living in the Christian subculture for believing that evolution is an all-but discredited theory propped up mostly by the philosophical biases of its atheistic proponents. Doubters are urged to read biologist Richard Dawkins's book or, better yet, selected quotes from Dawkins, paleontologist Stephen Jay Gould, and others agnostic evolutionists as reprinted in creationist literature. Indeed, Johnson boasts that Dawkins's Darwinian arguments for atheism inspired him to take on evolution in the first place. It's only a theory, Johnson concludes, and one with potentially damnable implications for religious faith.

In his 44-page judicial opinion issued on January 13th, federal district court judge Clarence Cooper of Atlanta belled this particular cat. Three years ago, responding to concerns expressed in a petition circulated by a local resident who identifies herself as a Biblical creationist and signed by about 2,300 local residents, the suburban Cobb County school board mandated that biology textbooks carry a sticker warning, "Evolution is a theory, not a fact, regarding the origin of living things. This material should be approached with an open mind, studied carefully, and critically considered." Some parents objected and sued the school district to remove the sticker.

On its face, the sticker seems harmless enough. Of course evolution (or at least Darwinism) is a theory, and all scientific theories merit critical consideration. Open minds are central to the scientific method. In ruling that the sticker violates the separation of church and state, however, Judge Cooper identifies four constitutional problems with this particular sticker.

First, Judge Cooper notes the long-standing and well known religious objections to the theory of evolution voiced by some conservative Christians over the years. Against this historical background, he concludes that "the informed, reasonable observer would perceived the School Board to be aligning itself with proponents of religious theories of origins." As such, the sticker constitutes an impermissible endorsement of religion under prevailing constitutional standards.

Second, Cooper stresses that evolution as more than just another theory of origins. It is the dominant scientific theory of origin accepted by the majority of scientists, he states. "This Sticker misleads students regarding the significance and value of evolution in the scientific community for the benefit of the religious alternative," Cooper writes.

Third, Cooper adds, "the Sticker targets only evolution to be approached with an open mind, carefully studied, and critically considered without explaining why it is the only theory being isolated as such." If school board members believed that all scientific theories should be so approached (as they testified at trial), why did they not say so on the sticker? Cooper asks rhetorically. In light of the historic opposition to the theory of evolution by certain religious groups, a reasonable observer would infer that the school board's action endorsed a particular religious viewpoint.

Fourth, the judge asserts that the Sticker undermines science education by playing on two meanings of the word "theory." In science, a theory is a well-tested explanation for observed facts, backed by substantial scientific evidence. Evolution is such a theory. In common conversation, however, "theory" suggests little more than a guess. Using this word in a textbook sticker, Cooper writes, "suggests to the informed, reasonable observer that evolution is only a highly questionable 'opinion' or a 'hunch'."

Public schools should accommodate students' religious beliefs. They certainly should not promote atheism. Given these four problems, however, Cooper concludes that "the Sticker's primary effect surpasses accommodation and endorses religion." In particular, it aids the belief of a particular group of religious believers that Cooper identifies as "Christian fundamentalists and creationists."

Although Cooper does not expand on this last point, it raises an important issue. Many Christians accept the theory of evolution. For some liberal Christians, evolution is central to their religious world view. Even many conservative Christians accept organic evolution as God's means of creation, and see no conflict between it an a high view of scripture. Theistic theories of evolution have a long and distinguished pedigree within evangelical Christian theology.

By cautioning students against all theories of evolution rather than solely atheistic ones, the Cobb County board of education appears to line up on one side of a deep dispute among Christians. On this basis, Cooper finds that the sticker also violates the Georgia state constitutional bar against using public monies in aid of a particular church or sect.

The issue is bigger than the Cobb County stickers. Responding to what they hear in their church communities, millions of Christian parents and taxpayers across America clamor for limits on teaching evolution in the public schools. Some settle for labels warning that evolution is only a theory, others ask for the inclusion of scientific evidence against evolution or for intelligent design in public school biology classes. More lawsuits dealing with variations on these ongoing themes will certainly follow. Cooper's ruling may deter some states and school districts from putting anti-evolution stickers on textbooks, but it won't discourage Christian creationists from demanding protection from what they see as a scientifically discredited and spiritually dangerous concept. After all, it's only a "theory."

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This article was first published by TC Record, a publication of the Teachers College at Columbia University and is reprinted with permission of the author.