I tried to exorcise my inner sloth today by taking a walk to the Smithsonian Museum. (Frank and I are in DC at the Intel Science Talent Search Back in high school, he got a great boost from this fine program, which puts teens in touch with their inner scientist.)
The attacks of the Christian Right on evolution are making big news in school districts around the country. After Creationism was pretty decisively barred from public school science courses (because it’s a religious doctrine), the same folks regrouped and came up with “Intelligent Design.”
I’m glad to see that Bush’s pandering to Jerry Falwell et al. has so far not impacted our national museum. The Smithsonian still has wonderful displays on the creation of the solar system from space dust, the extinction of dinosaurs millions of years ago, and even the evolution of modern humans.
<rant>But, speaking of intelligent design, how intelligent is it to insist that the Bible’s a science textbook? I mean, if God really had it in mind to teach people some science, why the heck did he not start with something useful like, oh for instance, how to prevent childbed fever?</rant>
This gorgeous sloth image was slothfully snipped from an excellent Smithsonian photo on Flickr by GreyArea, because none of my own photos came out so well.