By Ashleigh Mattern, The Sheaf (University of Saskatchewan)
SASKATOON (CUP) – Students who got a free copy of Charles Darwin’s On the Origin of Species on campuses this month might be surprised to find an introduction by intelligent design proponent Ray Comfort.
Comfort’s publisher, Living Waters Publications, are targeting North American universities during November to give “future doctors, lawyers and politicians . . . information about Intelligent Design,” according to their website. Intelligent design and creationism are beliefs opposed to Darwinian evolution, positing that a supernatural creator set life in motion.
On Nov. 19, two men set up outside the Killam Library with 200 copies for Dalhousie students. Kirk Hubick, one of the men, told people to make sure to read the “special introduction written by a friend of mine.” He says he paid for the books out of his own pocket.
On Nov. 9, an unknown group handed out several copies to passers-by at the University of Saskatchewan in Saskatoon. The books have also been handed out at the University of Alberta.
Torien Cafferata is the president of the University of Saskatchewan Freethought Alliance, a campus group for scientific integrity and secularism. He says he is concerned that the books were handed out on his campus “in a weaselly kind of way.”
Steve Newton, public information project director for the California-based National Center for Science Education, says Comfort and supporters plan to distribute the books to 100 American universities on Nov. 19, and 24 Canadian universities on Nov. 24, the 150th anniversary of the first publication of On the Origin of Species.
Cafferata says he thinks they may have changed their plans due to pressure from secularist groups like the Freethought Alliance.
“They learned that a lot of secularists’ societies were planning a counteroffensive, like to celebrate evolution on that day. We were planning to find out where they were planning to release the book, then we would set up next to them and have all the supportive facts for evolution.”
Dr. Jose Andrés, an evolutionary biologist at the U of S, says that one of his issues with Comfort’s introduction in the Living Waters Publications version is that it’s inappropriate for the scientific topic of the book.
The introduction talks about religion and “solving life’s more important questions,” but Andrés points out that “All of that has nothing to do, absolutely nothing to do, with the origin of the species.”
“It’s fine by me, and I’m happy to read that as the introduction to a religious book but not as the introduction to a piece of work that has to do with science.”
There are at least two versions of the book circulating campuses. In an open letter from Comfort on the Living Waters website, he writes, “My name will be on the cover (for those who think that we are somehow being deceptive),” but his name appears nowhere on the back or front cover on a copy obtained by Canadian University Press newspaper the Sheaf. Nor does it appear on the copies distributed on Dalhousie University.
The version handed out at the U of S is an older version, which Newton says has several chapters of Darwin’s original text removed and a slightly different introduction. In the version of Origin discussed for campus distribution on the Living Waters website, however, they say “nothing has been removed from Darwin’s original work.”
Joseph Anderson, an employee at Kenderdine Art Gallery at the U of S, happened to pick up a free copy. Having always wanted to read “On the Origin of Species,” Anderson says he was excited to get the free copy but said it surprised him to find out the introduction was written by a creationist.
“Just because the Origin of Species by Darwin has sort of been held up as an anti-Christian kind of book for so long, I was surprised it was being used as a missionary tool,” he says.
Still, he says compared to some of the religious groups he has encountered on his campus, the people handing out the books were innocuous.
“The way they went about it seems a gentle approach, which I appreciate,” he says. “I’m not for banning groups from campus or anything like that.”
Warren Kirkland, the University of Saskatchewan Students’ Union president, echoes Anderson’s sentiments, saying that as long as they’re being respectful and no one has complained, it isn’t an issue.
“The university is about embracing different views and thoughts,” Kirkland says.
Cafferata says he’s most worried about the students who pick up the book and think Comfort has a valid argument against evolution.
Robert Luhn, director of communications for the National Center for Science Education, agrees, saying the introduction has “bad science, bad history and bad theology.”
“The telling points being that it’s not just a matter of, gosh, Ray Comfort doesn’t know anything about science,” Luhn says. “He makes completely spurious claims. There’s no transitional fossils? There are transitional fossils in museums all over the world!”
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