Bay Area Skeptics Talk: “The year in anti-science-education legislation” by Glenn Branch

Free Event / Donations Encouraged

This critical thinking-focused organization meets Every Second Thursday of the month with a different topic and guest speaker for every conversational meeting.

THIS MONTH’S TOPIC: “The year in anti-science-education legislation” by Glenn Branch

From the first bill to ban the teaching of evolution — introduced in Kentucky in 1921 — to the present, legislation aimed at impeding science education has been a regular feature in statehouses around the country. In 2019 alone, no fewer than eighteen such bills have been introduced to date. In his talk, Glenn Branch of the National Center for Science Education, who routinely monitors such legislation, will discuss the varieties, sources, histories, intentions, and fates of these bills — and will do his best to promote the idea that South Dakota’s “Act to protect the teaching of certain scientific information” is cursed.

ABOUT THE SPEAKER

Glenn Branch is Deputy Director of the National Center for Science Education. He is the co-editor, with Eugenie C. Scott, of Not in Our Classrooms: Why Intelligent Design Is Wrong for Our Schools (2006), and the author or coauthor of numerous articles on creationism, evolution education, and climate change education in such publications as Scientific American, The American Biology Teacher, and Annual Review of Genomics and Human Genetics. He is a long-time student of pseudoscience of many types.

ABOUT BAY AREA SKEPTICS

Bay Area Skeptics was founded in June 1982 as the first “local interest group” inspired by the Center for Scientific Investigation of Claims of the Paranormal (CSICOP), now known as the Center for Scientific Inquiry (CSI). Although they have overlapping interests with CSI, BAS is independent of all other groups.

The organization encourages critical thinking and accuracy in the media and in our schools. They encourage rational thought and critical thinking through the use of scientific methods. They are particularly interested in such topics as claims of the paranormal, pseudoscience, and untested or poorly tested medical and psychotherapeutic practices.