Links to other websites
There are a number of UK websites covering the creationist and anti-creationist movements and their consequences for science education in schools. However, most of the web sites covering the issues are owned by US organisations and tend to be very US-specific. Below, links are given to the best of these as well.
Creationist smear and deception campaigns
- There is a Wikipedia entry for Truth in Science at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Truth_in_Science. One of the main contributors informed the BCSE in January 2007 that it has been heavily vandalised on numerous occasions by those sympathetic towards Truth in Science. Among many edits, large sections of text - including a transcript of a radio interview with Stuart Burgess - and the Truth in Science stance on speciation were blanked. The contributor stated that the TiS sympathisers used red herring arguments to exclude material, on the basis that it is "biased", "POV", and constitutes "original research"; however, the TiS sympathisers provided no argument, justification, or evidence to back these assertions.
- The BCSE has faced a smear campaign specifically aimed at it almost from the very beginning. BCSE Revealed Revealed will help you decide for yourself about the motives of the smearer and the reasons behind their campaign. The original smear blog and now the smear web page are filled with a multitude of baseless accusations. We will not waste time dignifying them with a response. The BCSE believes that the smear web site and blog are linked to Truth in Science.
Anti-creationist websites in the UK
- Truth in Science Revealed was compiled by one of our committee members.
- Science Just Science is a group of mostly British people of a broad background who are dedicated to keeping creationism and intelligent design out of the science classroom. Several BCSE members are members of SJS as well. It takes neither a religious nor a non-religious stance and membership is basically welcome to all who share the same objectives.
Pro-science websites in the UK
- The Complete Works of Charles Darwin Online is freely available with never-before-seen manuscripts. Currently 50% complete, with completion scheduled for 2009.
- Professor Richard Dawkins. Dawkins holds the Simonyi Professorship of Public Understanding of Science at Oxford University.
- The Royal Society, the British national academy of sciences and one of the world’s most prestigious science organisations, is now actively involved in countering creationism.
- The British Association for the Advancement of Science' is believed to be concerned about the growth of creationism in the UK. Its web site is at http://www.the-ba.net/the-ba.
- Christians in Science is overwhelmingly dominated by Christians who accept mainstream science and robustly dislike or dismiss creationism. As a result the group is antagonistic towards creationists. The movement says it has more than 650 members.
- Professor David Colquhoun, University College London, has a large part of his personal web site dedicated to anti-creationist material and associated issues.
- Also at University College, London is Professor Steve Jones, a serious anti-creationist activist and Professor of Genetics.
- Michael Brass is a South African archaeologist living in the UK and is the chairman of the BCSE. He has a long established web site focussing on his profession and which provides an extremely interesting insight into a wide range of issues including debunking pseudoscience.
Other organisations opposed to Creationism and Intelligent Design in the UK
There are a wide number of organisations in the UK that are very concerned about the growth in belief in creationism and its impact on schools and other areas of life. Whilst such organisations clearly have other big agendas, many are increasingly addressing the creationist issues. Many are very long established organisations and in some cases are highly prestigious.
- Two secularist organisations in the UK, the National Secular Society and the British Humanist Association, are both very concerned about the teaching of creationism in state schools and are active in opposing it.
- The Leicester Secular Society, another long established body is likewise opposed.
- The Ekklesia, a progressive think-tank that promotes radical theological ideas in public life.
- Alan Bellis, who was the founder of the now defunct anti-creationist Blackshadow forum.
- Stefan Walker, a former student of one of the Emmanuel Schools Foundation schools. He details his own personal experience there. It appears that the Emmanuel Schools Foundation, at the highest level, have taken an interest in it.
Online journals in the UK of relevance to evolutionary biology
Bioinformatics
Integrative and Comparative Biology
Journal of Heredity
Molecular Biology and Evolution
Mutagenesis
Nucleic Acids Research
(older articles are often available to the public as part of the Open Access Initiative)
Anti-creationist resources outside of the UK
- The National Center for Science Education: Another major resources in the United States is the web site of the National Center for Science Education, based in California. The NCSE (no relation to the BCSE) is the leading anti-creationist organisation in the United States. It says that it is dedicated to the teaching of evolution in public schools primarily in the face of attack by religiously motivated fundamentalists. The NCSE is extremely professionally run and its top staff are national public figures. The site provides a wealth of information on developments in the USA. It is, however, a not-for-profit organisation and does not spend its limited resources in campaigning or otherwise outside the USA.
- Talk Origins: One of the best resources on the Internet is the Talk Origins web site. The people behind this have built up an extremely comprehensive and easy to use database on the site, rubbishing just about every “scientific” claim ever put forward by creationists. Whilst the rebuttals are scientific replies to scientific statements in general they are easy to understand. With very few exceptions the site tells the user just how wrong, on a point by point basis, every creationist is. It is unremitting in its criticisms and debunking of creationist nonsense. Creationists therefore frequently smear it without showing how it is wrong. The site is very well referenced, is nearly all the work of people trained in science and has many links to other sites which expand on what it says. Moreover it has a talkback section updated every month which pulls to pieces individual statements by creationists posted to its Usenet forum.
- Talk Reason: Try also the Talk Reason web site for a number of anti-creationist papers and discussions.
- EvoWiki: It is based on Talk Origins, has an increasing amount of material on it. It describes itself as "The Evolution Education Wiki" and as a reader-built encyclopedia of evolution, biology, and origins. Its aim is to "to promote general evolution education, and to provide mainstream scientific responses to the arguments of creationism and other antievolutionists."
- Pharyngula: This is the highly acclaimed blog of PZ Myers. Science journal 'Nature' has listed Pharyngula as the top-ranked blog written by a scientist. PZ is an American academic and outspoken critic of ID.
- Sandwalk: Professor Larry Moran at the University of Toronto has an excellent blog which covers science as well as anti-creationist issues. Moran is a regular contributor to Talk Origins.
- The American Scientific Affiliation: This group hosts discussions of science and Christianity, ethics, and apologetics. While they take no official position on creationism, they promote dialogue and are predominantly pro-evolution, taking considerable interest in such topics as the ongoing research into the origins of life.
- No Answers In Genesis: This is an exceedingly good web site and discussion forum in Australia called No Answers in Genesis. Established by a no-nonsense anti-creationist, John Stear, it has a wealth of information on it. Stear pulls no punches with fundamentalists and in the way that Australian bluntness is, can be very witty.
- Edward Babinski: Begun by Edward Babinski, this website is a significant resource on evolution and creationism.
- Ken Miller's Evolution Page: Professor Miller is professor of biology and has co-authored textbooks in the subject. He has also been very active in opposing creationism.
- The Loom: Carl Zimmer's blog. He is a science writer for the New York Times and author of several books.
- Evolving Thoughts: John Wilkins blog. John's focus is on the philosophy of biology and he is quite active in the online community defending evolutionary biology.
- Palaeoblog: Evolution. Extinction. Fossilization. Blog of Michael J Ryan, Ph.D.
- Afarensis: This author's blog focuses on anthropology, evolution and science
- Professor John Hawks: Palaeoanthropology Weblog, regularly updated.
- Dienekes' Anthropology Blog: Dienekes focuses on genetics as well as anthropology and keeps up with many of the more recent papers in these fields
- The Daily Transcript: Alex Palazzo's blog has a good mixture of molecular biology and personal views. His posts often involve cutting-edge material in evolutionary biology
- Evolgen: The blog focuses on molecular population and evolutionary genetics and genomics
- Aetiology: Tara C. Smith focuses on current and emerging diseases and their evolution
- Evolutionblog: Jason Rosenhouse has a PhD in mathematics and focuses on issues related to evolution and creationism
- Evolutionary Times: Gerry L. covers topical news on discoveries in evolutionary fields and the politics of evolution's denial
- Panda’s Thumb: For the scientifically-minded, or even those with just a passing interest in science or popular science, the American discussion forum, Panda’s Thumb, has a lot of anti-creationist discussion in it as well as some very good science by some very good scientists. Some of the more strident atheism of a few in the group can be a bit off-putting to the religiously minded.
- Lenny Flank: His website provides a wealth of his well written, researched and thought-out articles and references on anti-creationism. Lenny is a member of the BCSE and has been an activist in the anti-creationist movement for over two decades.
- Todd Greene has a very informative personal web site which provides numerous links to other anti-creationist sources.
- The Clergy Project: Over 10,000 clergy have signed a document stating in part "We believe that the theory of evolution is a foundational scientific truth, one that has stood up to rigorous scrutiny and upon which much of human knowledge and achievement rests. To reject this truth or to treat it as 'one theory among others' is to deliberately embrace scientific ignorance and transmit such ignorance to our children."
- A Radiometric Dating Resource List: All about dating of rocks. Radiometric dating is one of the nightmares of young earth creationists (besides astronomy, of course). Young earth creationists absolutely despise radiometric dating, for the simple reason that in addition to corroborating the fact that the earth, specifically, is quite ancient, it actually puts a "clock" on the geologic strata and also gives scientists a good tool for estimating just how old the earth is. Needless to say, creationists put an awful lot of "propaganda effort" into distorting the science of radiometric dating. Here Dr. Tim Thompson provides numerous links, well organized, to online articles (and other resources) dealing specifically with radiometric dating in regard to young earth creationism. If you want to learn about the progandistic distortions of radiometric dating, and learn about the genuine science behind radiometric dating besides, this is a really good place to start.
Critiques of Intelligent Design arguments
As has been extensively documented at this site, the vast majority of those who are promoting "intelligent design" in the UK (including the supporters of Truth in Science) are in fact Young Earth Creationists who believe in a literal Garden of Eden and that the world is perhaps only ten thousand years old, but they are using the pseudo-science of intelligent design as a figleaf so that they may sneak their creationist arguments into our educational system. Nevertheless, intelligent design has been extensively critiqued in the United States. Here are a few resources:
Religious intolerance
The intelligent design movement isn't about science. It is about an ideological movement which is attempting to impose its views upon the rest of us. For those who doubt this, they need look no further than the Wedge Document which announced the Discovery Institute's goals. But there is much more.
A few resources in evolutionary biology on the web
- Understanding Evolution for K through 16, brought to you by Berkley and the National Center for Science Education
- Evolution Education Institute: A US professional development program originating in the Michigan Scientific Evolution Education Initiative. Lesson plans, links, articles and more.
- Howard Hughes Medical Institute is one of the world's largest philanthropies, supports considerable research in evolutionary developmental biology, supports education in evolutionary biology, and has newsletters as well as Sean Carroll.
- The Unofficial Stephen Jay Gould Archive biography, library reviews and interviews. One of the coauthors of punctuated equilibria theory, often a target of creationists and one of their more outspoken critics.
- Scientific Journals list at BioChemWeb. A list of some of the journals which regularly include articles of immediate relevance to evolutionary biology, many of which are available on the web.
Search engines and journal indexes outside the UK of relevance to evolutionary biology
Online journals outside the UK of relevance to evolutionary biology
- PLoS Journals (Public Library of Science Journals, US):
Biology
Computational Biology
Genetics
Medicine
Pathogens
One
(Articles are freely available to the public as part of the Open Access Initiative)
- Journal of Biology published by BioMed Central. Open Access.
- Molecular Systems Biology published by Nature. MSB is Open Access.
- Genome Research is an international, continuously published, peer-reviewed journal that focuses on research that provides novel insights into the genome biology of all organisms, including advances in genomic medicine (Older articles are often available to the public as part of the Open Access Initiative)
Faith-based schools
In so far as the British Centre for Science Education is a single issue organisation dedicated to trying to prevent the teaching of intelligent design and young earth creationism in science or as science in publicly funded schools, it has no position on publicly-funded faith-based schools.
Many people have robust opinions that faith-based schools are relevant to the issues which we address. However, our position is that we can only be interested where faith-based schools are used to push young earth creationism and/or intelligent design as science or in the science classroom and in that we do not differentiate them from other publicly financed schools pushing these same agendas.
The issue of faith-based schools is a very wide-ranging and complex part of public policies towards education in the United Kingdom.
As a consequence we have no hesitation in referring the public to other organisations that are addressing the issues of faith-based schools – both for and against. Whilst this does not mean that we necessarily agree with the position of such organisations, we are happy to work with them in addressing the issues where and when we find common cause and there are no major conflicts of interest with our single issue policy.
We would be very grateful if readers and others could provide us with the URLs of organisations both in favour of or opposed to faith based schools. Please feel free to e-mail us with details.
Here are some such web sites:
Creationist propaganda
If you want to see creationist or intelligent design propaganda, any and all of the creationist web sites will do just fine.
There are a lot of them. Plus also the blogs, particularly that of Intelligent Design advocate, Bill Dembski , at http://www.uncommondescent.com.
One of the most entertaining but, indeed worrying, “exposés” of creationism is Fundies Say the Darndest Things. The site quotes and ranks opinions of fundamentalists from a wide variety of web sites across the Internet but nearly all appear to be quotes from Americans and Canadians. The site brings together in copious quantities opinions of fundamentalists which demonstrate stupidity, zealotery and bigotry on an industrial scale. Much of the stuff is deeply offensive as well. It does not paint a pretty picture of fundamentalism or its adherents.
