US 'intelligent design' trial enters fifth week
A school administrator and a British sociology professor were expected to testify today in the fifth week of a landmark US federal trial over whether “intelligent design” can be mentioned in public school biology classes.
Lawyers for the Dover Area School Board in Pennsylvania planned to call Steven Fuller, a sociology professor at the University of Warwick, as an expert witness.
Fuller is expected to bolster the school board’s contention that intelligent design, which holds that life on Earth was the product of an unidentified intelligent force, is a scientific concept.
Assistant Superintendent Michael Baksa, who was called to testify for the defence on Friday, was expected to resume his testimony today after Fuller’s questioning concluded.
The school board voted a year ago to require students to hear a statement about intelligent design before ninth-grade biology lessons on evolution. The statement says Charles Darwin’s theory is “not a fact”, has inexplicable “gaps”, and refers students to a textbook - Of Pandas and People - for more information.
