Steve Abrams is chairman of the Kansas State Board of Education and has been the leading figure in that state's efforts to undermine the teaching of evolution in favor of religious pseudoscience like Intelligent Design. Usually, he insists that he only seeks a "fair" hearing of all sides in the classroom, but recently he admitted his real goal.

The Lawrence Journal World reports (via Panda's Thumb):

Abrams, a Republican from Arkansas City, has led a successful charge by the 6-4 conservative majority on the education board to adopt science standards that cast doubts about the theory. During a question-and-answer period to a mostly receptive audience of church-going social conservatives fed up with evolution, Abrams said one couldn’t believe in the Bible and evolution. You must believe one or the other.

“At some point in time, if you compare evolution and the Bible, you have to decide which one you believe,” Abrams said. “That’s the bottom line.”

The majority of the approximately 75 people who had gathered in a former post office converted to a history museum said “Amen” to Abrams’ speech. The meeting was coordinated by a small, local group of Christian men called Open Public Education Now. [emphasis added]

Pat Hayes (Red State Rabble) comments on Abrams’ duplicity:

Abrams statement that one must choose between evolution and the bible is somewhat different than his mantra at the science hearings in Topeka last May. There, he said “I have been a proponent... of empirical science being defined by observable, measurable, testable, repeatable, and falsifiable... “ so often, that the audience began to mouth the words with him.

This is but one more example, among the many that might be cited, of the basic dishonesty of creationist and intelligent design advocates who say one thing in public where everyone can hear them, and quite another when they are speaking privately before groups that share their views.

The dishonesty of Intelligent Design, as with all forms of creationism, begins right away with the insistence that one’s conclusions about the nature and development of life conform with one’s prior commitments to some religious ideology. Once a person has made the decision that the evidence must conform to some desired conclusion, the entire project becomes rife with intellectual dishonesty. The fact that a bit more dishonesty is added to the mix, like dishonesty about one’s actual goals, is no longer a difficult step to make.

Read More:

• Evolution vs. Creationism
• Science vs. Religion
• What is Creationism?
• What is Intelligent Design?
• What is Balanced Treatment?
• What is Science?
• Religious Right