When a SAD 59 board member called for removing the study of evolution from his district’s school curriculum last month, he became a star in the remake of a tragic comedy that has been performed for over 150 years.

English naturalist Charles Darwin’s “On the Origin of Species,” published in 1859, gave the first comprehensive explanation of why wildlife species and fossils vary over geographic expanse and time. Darwin called it “natural selection.” Darwin theorized that random mutations allowed certain species to adapt more successfully than others to their particular environment and thus to survive and procreate.

His explanation – the theory of evolution – was and still is attacked by religious fundamentalists on the basis that it is speculative, a claim that rests on a misunderstanding of both evolution and science.

Scientists use the term “theory” to describe even the most well established natural laws, including gravity, relativity and quantum mechanics. They concede nonetheless that a theory can be modified, elaborated or even discarded in favor of a new theory that better explains a natural occurrence.

This does not mean theories are unproven or unprovable speculation. They are based upon careful observation of nature, the creation of hypotheses to explain and predict natural phenomena, and systematic experiments to test such hypotheses. When experimentation leads to results inconsistent with a theory, however, a new explanation is sought.

Evolution is not only grounded in observation but in prediction. For instance, new fossil species have been discovered, the existence of which were previously predicted by observing evolutionary trends, and seemingly useless anatomical structures have been proven to promote the survival of species.

In recent years, evolution has come under attack by advocates of the doctrine of creationism and its successor, intelligent design. Those who profess these doctrines – which hold that life forms are too complex to have come from random mutation and, therefore, must be the handiwork of a transcendent power – have tried to insert thinly disguised religious ideas into school curricula, claiming them to be theories as valid as evolution.

There are two problems with intelligent design.

First, the Constitution bans the teaching of subjects that advance religion in public schools. Second, it is an anti-scientific concept that tries to blur the boundaries between the provable and the unprovable.

Despite longstanding acceptance of evolution within the scientific community and the public, visceral religious opposition to it has continued to surface. SAD 59 is but the latest example.

Though he first conceived the rudiments of natural selection in 1838, Darwin delayed making his theory public for years, in part because he feared a backlash from religious groups who believed God created the world in seven days and made its original life forms immutable. The corollary of Darwin’s theory – that man and apes evolved from a common ancestor – would prove particularly obnoxious to those who literally interpreted the Bible as placing man at the center of creation.

Darwin was right to worry!

“Origin of the Species” evoked a storm of angry criticism from churchmen and even some religiously devout men of science. Shy and retiring, Darwin let T.H. Huxley, a prominent Victorian scientist, publicly defend his ideas.

Nicknamed “Darwin’s bulldog,” Huxley crossed verbal swords in a famous debate with Bishop Samuel Wilberforce in 1860. In the debate, Wilberforce sarcastically asked Huxley whether he had evolved from an ape on his mother’s or his father’s side.

The most famous attack on evolution in the United States was the 1925 Scopes “monkey trial.” John Scopes, a high school teacher in Tennessee, was charged with violating a state law against teaching evolution, after he used a textbook based on Darwin’s theory.

Populist orator and ex-presidential hopeful William Jennings Bryan acted as prosecutor, while Clarence Darrow, the most renowned lawyer of his time, defended Scopes. Scopes was convicted after a highly publicized trial and assessed a fine, but the Tennessee Supreme Court later reversed his conviction on a technicality, allowing Scopes to escape punishment.

The trial, however, had a chilling effect on education. For years afterward, publishers of biology textbooks prudently omitted chapters on evolution.

Modern advances in genetics, especially the 1953 discovery of DNA’s structure by Crick and Watson, rekindled scholastic interest in evolution by explaining the microscopic mechanisms that cause mutation.

Though religion has clashed with the science of evolution, the two are not necessarily inconsistent. Many believe the laws of nature are so complex and elegant they must have been devised and set in motion by a divine being, while others hold that religious faith begins where science ends, such as in providing explanations for the beginning of the cosmos and the origin of life.

Some of the greatest scientists in history have seen no contradiction between faith and science. Isaac Newton spent almost as much time writing religious tracts as treatises on mathematics and physics. Albert Einstein said, “Science without religion is lame. Religion without science is blind.” In criticizing the statistical nature of quantum theory, he famously remarked, “I am convinced that God does not play dice.”

But the use of religion to suppress or dilute scientific study in schools not only denies young people the opportunity to pursue the truth science offers, it undermines the very dignity of the religious faith it purports to defend.

Elliott L. Epstein, a local attorney, is founder and board president of Museum L-A and an adjunct history instructor at Central Maine Community College. He can be reached at [email protected]