Creationists Fail in Florida

Creationists: "If you put evolution in textbooks, you have to call it a scientific theory."
School Board: "Um, sure. And let's teach kids what that actually means too."
Creationists: "HAHAHAHA... wait, what?"

The Florida Board of Education officially upheld evolution yesterday.

The board didn't quite mean to do that, of course. In a 4-3 vote, the Board accepted a proposed curriculum that replaced all references to evolution with the phrase "the scientific theory of evolution." In so doing, the board inadvertently made evolution central to public school science education, and also, almost incidentally, mandated education on just what constitutes a "scientific theory." (linky-to-story in Wired)

I love it when Creationists show short sighted and the inability to smell a trap by smart people. Apparently, the opposition only needed to put a brown paper bag on the floor, and the Creationists wouldn't have been able to escape it.

Not only will Florida's students learn about evolution; they'll also learn that the scientific definition of a theory is different from the everyday definition , referring not to wild-eyed speculation but to a vast body of observation and testing that confirms a hypothesis so strongly that it might as well be considered fact.

Thanks and a shout out to religious critics of evolution education. The language change will better help Florida's children understand not only evolution, but science itself.

Suck it.