Bosma shelves creationism bill; IUN celebrates Darwin Day

On the eve of today's celebration of Charles Darwin's birthday at IUN, the Indiana House speaker said he is shelving a bill that would have allowed public schools to teach creationism in science classes.

Republican Brian Bosma said he is using a procedural move to kill the proposal for this legislative session.

He said he considered the proposal a lawsuit waiting to happen since the U.S. Supreme Court has ruled before against public schools teaching creationism.

Controversy has been brewing over the creationism bill since it passed the Republican-controlled Indiana Senate by a vote of 28-22. The bill approved would have permitted local school districts to teach creationism as long as it included origin of life theories from multiple religions including Christianity, Judaism, Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism and Scientology.

More than 150 years ago, Darwin started a revolution in the way people think about the age of the earth and how plants and animals change.

"Darwin realized he was starting something new," said Robert Mucci, associate professor of anthropology at Indiana University Northwest.

To celebrate Darwin's 203rd birthday, Indiana University Northwest's Anthropology Club is hosting its 14th annual Darwin Day program Wednesday with four talks weaving evolution into science and the humanities.

The free program runs from noon to 2:30 p.m. in the Library Conference Center, Room 105ABC.

Darwin Day at IUN is part of the International Celebration of Science and Humanities that also honors the 153rd anniversary of Darwin's book, "On the Origin of Species." Yet the international celebration is only a quarter-century old, said Mucci, who organized Darwin Day 2012 at IUN.

"About 25 years ago, some scientists said, 'Why not talk about Darwin? It doesn't attract as much controversy as it once did,'" he said.

Mucci said the importance of evolution stretches beyond science classes to the social sciences and the evolution of social systems.

"Society changes over time," he said. The mechanism for that change is natural selection.

"People change plants and animals by selective breeding," Mucci said. "Darwin also saw that nature changes plants and animals."

The Associated Press contributed to this report.