Author: Ophelia Benson

Michael Reiss, a priest, a biologist and the Royal Society’s director of eduation, says he ‘feels’ that ‘creationism is best seen by science teachers not as a misconception but as a world view.’

But a world view can be a misconception, and often is. The two are not contradictory or mutually exclusive. That is in fact a problem with a lot of world views: they are based on misconceptions.

Other scientists, fortunately, disagree with Reiss.

Professor Reiss, a biologist, was speaking at the British Association’s Festival of Science in Liverpool. Other scientists were vociferous in their response, saying that creationism should remain entirely within the sphere of religious education. Professor Lewis Wolpert, of University College Medical School, said: “Creationism is based on faith and has nothing to do with science, and it should not be taught in science classes. It is based on religious beliefs and any discussion should be in religious studies.” Dr John Fry, a physicist at the University of Liverpool, said: “Science lessons are not the appropriate place to discuss creationism, which is a world view in total denial of any form of scientific evidence. Creationism doesn’t challenge science: it denies it!”

The Independent takes a ‘this side that side’ view, as if it were running for office.

Proponents of evolution believe species change by a process of random genetic mutations. They believe the world is 13-14 billion years old. Creationists, in contrast, believe that the Earth is less than 10,000 years old, and that its existence is the result of one of the processes described in religious texts like the Bible.

It’s not a matter of each side ‘believing’ things in exactly the same sense, and shouldn’t be presented as such. One side has grounds for the ‘belief’ and the other side doesn’t, so it’s misleading to use the same word for both unless that is pointed out.

Sabina Guzzanti could get five years in prison for ‘offending the honour of the sacred and inviolable person’ of Benedict XVI. Who knew? Who knew the pope’s person was ‘sacred and inviolable’ as a matter of law in Italy? I suppose I might have guessed it was if anyone had asked me directly – ‘Excuse me, do you think the person of the pope is sacred and inviolable as a matter of law in Italy?’ – but no one had asked me directly, or indirectly either – ‘Excuse me, how do you think Italian law treats the person of the pope? Any guesses?’, and I didn’t know. I can’t be everywhere at once you know – I only have two hands.

But now I do know, and I think it’s an outrage.

Giovanni Ferrara, the Rome prosecutor, is invoking the 1929 Lateran Treaty between Italy and the Vatican, which stipulates that an insult to the Pope carries the same penalty as an insult to the Italian President.

Oh – so an insult to the Italian President carries a penalty of five years in prison? Who knew? That one I wouldn’t even have guessed, even if someone had asked me directly. I would have said oh don’t be so silly, of course there’s no such law in Italy. Shows what I know.

The July rally [at which Guzzanti committed her crime] was called to protest against alleged interference by the Vatican and the Catholic Church in Italian affairs, from abortion to gay rights, but also to attack the Prime Minister for passing “ad personam” laws to protect his own interests and avoid prosecution on corruption allegations.

Gee, I can’t see why anyone would object to laws like that, can you? ‘I, the president, rule that it shall be against the law to attempt to charge with with any crimes I may happen to have committed while in office.’ What’s wrong with that? Guy’s got to be able to concentrate, after all.

The move to prosecute her over her anti-papal remarks was praised by some on the centre Right, including Luca Volonte, a Christian Democrat, who said that “gratuitous insults must be punished”.

By a prison sentence. Of five years. What an interesting way to think about the matter.

Pink News points out that this is all a tad fascist, literally.

The Minister of Justice in Italy has given prosecutors permission to use a Fascist-era law to punish a comedian for mocking the Pope…Now the Rome prosecutor has been given permission to proceed against her under the 1929 Lateran Treaty. The treaty, between the Vatican and the Italian government, was signed when fascist leader Benito Mussolini was in power.

Gone but not forgotten, apparently.

In case you’re wondering why posting has been a tad intermittent of late, it’s just that I’m working on revisions of the book and I have other calls on my time at the moment. But I’ll be back to normal garrulity and belligerence soon.

Something Madeleine Bunting said in her piece on ‘faith’ schools yesterday.

[O]ver 70% of people in this country still describe themselves as Christian; that may not mean going to church but it may mean wanting children to grow up with broadly Christian values.

But what are broadly Christian values? They’re probably not really Christian values at all, that is, not values that depend on believing that Jesus rose from the dead on the third day and was bodily resurrected and hauled up into heaven. (It’s a little hard to know what values would depend on believing that, really. Atonement? But is the Christian version of that really a value? If it is is it a broadly Christian value? It’s well known that the Christian atonement can seem like a very dubious bit of morality indeed to outsiders.) Bunting probably means simply values that are mistakenly attributed to Christianity but are in fact in no way exclusive to Christianity or dependent on it – values like compassion, mercy, universal love, a kind of irrational generosity. Those are admirable values (whatever the worries about the potential of extravagant compassion to encourage cruel people to go on being cruel), but they are not theistic values. It’s also not entirely clear that they’re Christian values even in the sense of ‘Christian’ being a shorthand for the abovementioned values like compassion and the rest – because to many people Christian values apparently means not turning the other cheek but various things to do with sex and alcohol. It is, frankly, not really a useful phrase, being flawed from more than one direction.