Product Description

A compelling eyewitness account of the recent courtroom drama in Dover, Pennsylvania that put evolution on trial.

Journalist Gordy Slack offers a riveting, personal, and often amusing first–hand account that details six weeks of some of the most widely ranging, fascinating, and just plain surreal testimony in U.S. legal history—a battle between hard science and religious conservatives wishing to promote a new version of creationism in schools.

During the Kitzmiller vs. Dover Areas School Board trial,  the members of the local school board defended their decision to require teachers to present intelligent design  alongside evolution as an explanation for the origins and diversity of life on earth. The trial revealed much more than a disagreement about how to approach science education. It showed two essentially different and conflicting views of the world and the lengths some people will go to promote their own. The ruling by George W. Bush–appointed Judge John Jones III was unexpected in its stridency: Not only did he conclude that intelligent design was religion and not science and therefore had no place in a science classroom, he scolded the school board for wasting public time and money.

A sophisticated examination of the deep cultural, religious, and political tensions that continue to divide America, The Battle Over the Meaning of Everything is also journalist Gordy Slack’s personal and engaging story of the high drama and unforgettable characters on both sides of the courtroom controversy. 
Gordy Slack (Oakland, CA) has been writing about science and evolutionary biology for 15 years. He is a regular commentator on KQED, an affiliate of NPR, and his articles have appeared in Mother Jones, Salon.com, Wired, California Wild, the San Francisco Chronicle, and many other publications.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #542952 in Books
• Published on: 2007-06-08
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Hardcover
• 240 pages

Review
Slack, the former editor of natural history magazine Pacific Discovery, has long covered clashes between scientists and creationists, and he knows both sides thoroughly—his own father, an experimental psychologist, took up creationism in the late 1990s, following a conversion to fundamentalist Christianity. In 2005, online magazine Salon assigned Slack to cover a federal court case in which a group of parents sued a Pennsylvania school board after it voted to include creationist material in high school science curricula. While Slack never hides his own convictions—firmly in support of evolution—he is staunchly evenhanded throughout, giving all players the opportunity to represent themselves and their ideas. Everyone involved in the case—the presiding judge, the opposing teams of attorneys, the students and townspeople of Dover—come alive in Slack′s economical yet revealing prose, and his history of both the contemporary creationist resurgence and the long–running philosophical debates behind it provide some much needed perspective on modern American culture wars. In this must–read for anyone involved in education—from federal officials to local school board voters—Slack demonstrates in crisp, clear language how science and religion are not opposites but different ways of thinking, each valuable for different purposes. (June) (Publishers Weekly, December 31, 2007)

"concise and readable." (Nature, 19th July 2007)

Review
"...must–read for anyone involved in education – Slack demonstrates in crisp, clear language how science and religion are not opposites but different ways of thinking, each valuable for different purposes." (Publishers Weekly, December 31, 2007)

"…a truly uplifting tale." (New Scientist, 1st August 2007)

"concise and readable." (Nature, 19th July 2007)

From the Inside Flap

The Battle Over the Meaning of Everything

"For six weeks in 2005, a courtroom in Pennsylvania became a forum for intense debates about the most fundamental matters: science, faith, and what we should teach our children about them. Gordy Slack takes us inside that courtroom, where his personal and intellectual engagement with the subject serves him exceedingly well. He has written a lively, lucid account of a fascinating trial."
—Margaret Talbot, staff writer, "Darwin in the Dock," The New Yorker

The Battle Over the Meaning of Everything is a compelling eyewitness account of the recent courtroom drama in Dover, Pennsylvania, that put evolution and intelligent design on trial. Journalist Gordy Slack offers a riveting, personal, and often amusing first–hand account that details six weeks of some of the most widely ranging, fascinating, and just plain surreal testimony in U.S. legal history—a battle between hard science and religious conservatives wishing to promote a new version of creationism in schools.

During the Kitzmiller vs. Dover trial, members of the local school board defended their effort to require teachers to present intelligent design alongside evolution as an explanation for the origins and diversity of life on Earth. The trial revealed two essentially different and conflicting views of the world and the lengths to which true believers on each side will go to promote their own. The controversial ruling by George W. Bush–appointed Judge John Jones III was full of surprises and had a profound influence on America′s educational landscape.

Gordy Slack′s engaging story of high drama and unforgettable characters is a sophisticated examination of the deep cultural, religious, and political faultlines that divide America. But it is also a personal account of how those same divisions cleaved his own family in two.