The Devil in Dover

"Six years ago, Lauri Lebo was a local reporter for the York Daily Record , which is a small newspaper in Pennsylvania. The York Daily Record served the town of Dover where a major confrontation between evolution and intelligent design was taking place. The local school board required the teachers in high school to prepare a curriculum on intelligent design. The teachers refused, the board insisted and it ended up in court. The lawsuit was filed by 11 parents. Lauri reported on every aspect of that trial and at the end wrote this marvellous book, The Devil in Dover . To date, four books have been written on the court case but this is the best. That’s right. It doesn’t just recount what happened in the court room. Because Lauri is a resident of this area and knows protagonists on both sides of the issue, she was able to explain, in a very sympathetic way, the motivations not only of the teachers and parents who stood up for good science and evolution, but also the motivation of the pro-intelligent design people. There were really three stories in this trial. One was the legal argument around the first amendment to the US Constitution, which is what mattered to the court. Second were the scientific arguments around evolution, and third was the personal story of how this issue divided a small town. It is lively, well-written and for any of your readers looking for insight into the character of this debate in the US on a very personal level, you couldn’t pick a better book. There are two reasons. The US is still a very religious country, and as long as you have a third of Americans being told when they go to church on Sunday that evolution is a plot to deprive them of their immortal souls, this is going to be a controversial issue. The second element which is different from the UK and Europe is that education in the US is a local function. That means that, in addition to being concerned about this issue, Americans everywhere think they have the right to control it in their local school. That empowers them to think: We don’t care what the authorities at Harvard, Stanford or Chicago have to say, in our schools we are going to teach whatever we want. For better or for worse, that is part of the American character. October 12, 2012. Updated: February 2, 2019 Five Books aims to keep its book recommendations and interviews up to date. If you are the interviewee and would like to update your choice of books (or even just what you say about them) please email us at [email protected] Support Five Books Five Books interviews are expensive to produce. If you've enjoyed this interview, please support us by donating a small amount ."