New Tennessee Monkey Law!

Like you said, teachers in public schools already are allowed to introduce scientific evidence that conflicts with other scientific evidence. So this law doesn't really do much other than encourage teachers to introduce alternative evidence and give defense to teachers who would like to use school time to promote religion.In practice, few alternatives are ever taught through highschool. There simply is not enough time in the day nor money in the school budget to allow teachers to elaborate on all the different scientific opinions regarding every matter they teach. My guess is that even with this law in place there still won't be enough such time. Either nothing will change, or good science will get pushed out in favor of crackpot creationism. So, I agree with you: this law can have no purpose other than to promote the advancement of religion in the public schools.I almost wonder, though, how many biology teachers there are out there that desperately want to teach anti-evolution nonsense. I would think there wouldn't be too many; I mean, evolution is such a central part of biological studies, it is difficult to see how anyone so opposed to it could find themselves teaching biology; it'd be like an Amish person teaching computer science. And how many of those are there?Jon

I guess it must be location, then. The highschool I went to had a very knowledgeable set of teachers, with the older ones generally having a better grasp on their subject matter. My chemistry teacher, for example, really did know chemistry and I honestly cannot see how anyone could have taught the material he taught without knowing it at a rather deep level. Not all my teachers were as bright, and some were more knowledgeable in certain aspects of their subject matter than in others. On the whole, however, it was very clear that the teachers in my school weren't placed based on seniority or any other ass-kissing system.So I guess my opinion was biased. Well, 'ain't' is a word, and English is capitalized. I'm sorry you've had this experience (if you have). My experience has been quite different, though. Actually, funny story. When I was in 10th grade, my family took a trip to California. While there, we met a gal in a waiting room who was working on her homework. She said she was in 12th grade; she was doing 'social studies' using the same book my brother and I had used... when we were in 9th grade!So yeah... I can totally see there being big differences depending on where you live.Jon

Yeah. Standards were looser in the lower grades.