Book Description

What do you know about evolutionary theory? Or, maybe there are two questions here: (1) What do you think you know; (2) What do you actually know? Quite irrespective of whether individuals believe in evolution or they are opposed to it, most people probably would have to acknowledge that they know almost nothing at all about the actual nuts and bolts of the technical issues at the heart of evolutionary theory. Their beliefs concerning this matter -- whatever the character of those beliefs might be -- is, for the most part, likely to be framed by, and filtered through, two themes: (a) a largely unexamined acceptance of the opinion of others; (b) the extent to which evolutionary theory makes carrying on with the rest of their philosophical or religious perspective either easier or more difficult to continue to do. Seeking the truth should neither be a function of blindly following the beliefs of other individuals, nor should that process be a function of what one finds easy or difficult to do, Therefore, irrespective of what your conceptual orientation concerning evolution might be, this book was written to challenge readers to critically reflect on various problems so that individuals might be able to work their way toward gaining greater insight into a variety of issues that swirl about the topic of evolution. Finally, Evolution Unredacted offers a critical analysis of several landmark legal decisions involving the dispute between proponents of evolution and advocates for creationism -- namely, McLean v. Arkansas Board of Education and Kitzmiller, et al v. Dover Area School District, et al. More specifically, the final chapter of Evolution Unredacted engages the evolution v. creationism debate through the filters of the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment and Article IV, Section 4 of the Constitution. The results of the foregoing analysis are likely to surprise the reader. Moreover, those results tend to entail a variety of implications for the process of education.