Frist says intelligent design should be taught in schools
NASHVILLE — Echoing similar comments from President Bush, Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist said Friday that “intelligent design” should be taught in public schools alongside evolution.
Frist, a Harvard-educated transplant surgeon, told reporters after speaking to a Rotary Club meeting that students need to be exposed to different ideas, including intelligent design.
“I think today a pluralistic society should have access to a broad range of fact, of science, including faith,” Frist said. “I think having kids exposed to both doesn’t force any particular theory on anyone. I think in a pluralistic society that is the fairest way to go about education and training people for the future.”
The theory of intelligent design says life on earth is too complex to have developed through evolution, implying that a higher power must have had a hand in creation.
Nearly all scientists dismiss intelligent design as a scientific explanation of the origins of life, and critics say it’s nothing more than religion masquerading as science.
Bush recently told a group of Texas reporters that intelligent design and evolution should both be taught in schools “so people can understand what the debate is about.”
That comment sparked criticism from opponents, including Democratic Party Chairman Howard Dean, who called Bush “anti-science.” Dean also is a physician.
Vicki Greene, a scholar with the Center for the Study of Religion and Culture at Vanderbilt University, said teaching intelligent design would be appropriate in a religion class but not one within a framework of science.
“I think there’s a lot of benefit to teaching many different ideas to students,” Greene said. “But what I don’t think is that intelligent design meets the criteria of being a scientific theory. In order to do that, it has to be something that makes predictions you can test. But it’s not testable.”
Frist, a Tennessee Republican who is considering a presidential campaign in 2008, had recently angered some conservatives by bucking Bush policy on embryonic stem cell research, voicing his support for expanded research on the subject.
Frist said his decision to endorse stem cell research was “a matter of science,” but he said there was no conflict between his position on stem cell research and his position on intelligent design.
“I base my beliefs on stem cell research both on science and my faith,” Frist said.
When asked if he had read comments from former Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott’s new book, which blames Frist for Lott’s fall from his powerful position, Frist said he had not but called Lott a “very close personal friend. I can tell you he is an effective United States senator. He serves the people of Mississippi very well and in a very constructive way. He’s been very helpful to me as I’ve served as leader.”
Frist said he will return to Nashville when his Senate term expires after 2006, and then he will make a decision on the 2008 presidential race.