Retired Science Teacher Seeks to Bar Evolution from Classrooms
A retired science teacher believes the teaching of evolution is "bad science" and has asked a federal court to declare it illegal to teach the subject in public schools.
Tom Ritter, a former physics and chemistry teacher of over 10 years, filed a lawsuit earlier this month against evolution in the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Pennsylvania, the same court that ruled that teaching of intelligent design in public schools is unconstitutional.
Ritter told The Christian Post this week that he didn't pay too much attention to biology before, but now in retirement he saw problems that he couldn't overlook any longer.
"It kind of got to be like picking a scab," he said.
In his one-page brief and one-page suit, Ritter argues that the Blue Mountain School District in Orwigsburg, Penn., is an illegal body because it teaches evolution.
A local resident, Ritter wants the district to stop collecting taxes from him until such teaching is halted. This is one scheme in his plan to get rid of public schools altogether, which he considers to be a waste of taxpayer dollars.
The suit contends that the 2005 Kitzmiller v. Dover decision forbids any teaching of evolution that includes a creator. It also argues that evolution is unscientific.
According to Ritter, evolution is unscientific for three reasons: no one has demonstrated that life can be created from non-life; no one has demonstrated that a new "sexual species" can be created; and no one has demonstrated how the human brain evolved from lower forms.
Since evolution is unscientific and teaches the absence of a creator, it is actually teaching atheism, the suit contends. Therefore, teaching evolution should be illegal in public schools because it is a religion.
"Objectively, Atheism is a religion, albeit a silly and unscientific one," the Jan. 18 suit states. "This is like teaching Jesus is Lord."
While Ritter said his court filings are really made for "popular consumption," he does expect to have his day in court.
"I think it will be taken seriously aside from the fact that I know some science," he said.
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