Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, January 25, 2001, Thursday,  EDITORIAL, Pg. A-14,

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

ABOUT SCIENCE CURRICULUM

BYLINE: PHILIP S. SKELL; STATE COLLEGE

    The Nov. 29 article by staff writer Pamela Winnick is a fair
description of the arguments from both sides relating to the Department of
Education's proposed revision of the public school's science curriculum
("Proposed Rules Boost Teaching Creationism"), but the Jan. 7 Forum article
by Leonard Krishtalka ("Don't Let Creationists Corrupt Science Standards")
is simply a rant about the subject.

    His comments do not rise to a level worthy of reply in this forum,
except to note his ire centers on the consequences of substituting the
Genesis creation account for Darwinian science, and that subsequently we
should expect these "enemies of science" will try to change the value of pi
to 3 and further such nonsense, none of which is, in the remotest sense,
under consideration or discussion in Harrisburg.

    The science related to origins of life is negligible and totally
irrelevant to the education of students in preparation for careers in
modern biology, or for understanding the current status of the field.

      The theory posits that an ancient soup of organic chemicals (for
which there is no geological evidence), self-assembled, by chance alone,
into living matter. Proteins are some of the essential ingredients required
for cellular activity. The simplest bacteria require 300 to 500 different
proteins for minimal function, made from the required 20 different amino
acids. It has been reliably demonstrated that self-assembly by chance, of
a
single small functional protein, of 100 amino acids length, could occur in
one chance out of 1,000,000,0 -- (500 zeros); for 300 different proteins,
one chance out of a number with a million zeros. It is ludicrous to give
this scenario serious consideration -- counting all the atoms in the entire
universe, the number has only 80 zeros! Of what value is this theory for
the education of our children?

    The curriculum controversy can be finessed by omitting this origins
part of the theory. But, if people insist on its inclusion, it surely
should not be included as dogma: "That is how it happened!" but with proper
scientific examination of its validity.

    An intriguing question: Why do some people insist it must be part of
the curriculum, in its dogmatic form? At best, it is a theory about ancient
natural history, 3.5 to 4 billion years ago, and completely irrelevant to
modern research and understanding.

    PHILIP S. SKELL
    State College

    Editor's note: The writer is Emeritus Evan Pugh Professor of Chemistry,
Penn State University, and a member of the National Academy of Sciences.