Scopes II: The great debate : creation vs. evolution

by Bill Keith

The creation–evolution controversy (also termed the creation vs. evolution debate or the origins debate) involves a recurring cultural, political, and theological dispute about the origins of the Earth, of humanity, and of other life. The evolution-creation controversy is almost exclusively an invention and problem within American-Protestant religious communities, outside of which such a controversy largely does not exist. The level of support for evolution is extremely high within the scientific community[1][2][3][4] and in academia.[5] While the controversy has a long history,[6][7] today it is mainly over what constitutes good science education,[8][9] with the politics of creationism primarily focusing on the teaching of creation and evolution in public education.[10][11][12][13][14] This debate is most prominent in the United States, and to a lesser extent in Europe and elsewhere,[15] and is often portrayed as part of a culture war.[16] Christian fundamentalists dispute the evidence of common descent of humans and other animals as demonstrated in modern paleontology, genetics, histology and cladistics and those other sub-disciplines which are based upon the conclusions of modern evolutionary biology, geology, cosmology, and other related fields. They argue for the Abrahamic accounts of creation, framing them as reputable science ("creation science").

193 pages, Paperback

Published January 1, 1982

About the author

Former Louisiana senator Bill Keith earned a bachelor of arts degree in journalism from Wheaton College in Illinois. He continued his studies at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Fort Worth, Texas. Following graduation, Keith worked as a journalist for forty years and traveled to thirty-five foreign countries. Some of his journalistic credits include working as a war correspondent in Vietnam, an investigative reporter for the Shreveport Times, and city editor for the Shreveport Journal. He resides in Longview, Texas, with his wife and is a full-time writer. "