Holt criticizes Bush on science
Rep. Rush Holt (D?N.J.) began his speech to the joint meeting of the American Chemical Society and the American Institute of Chemical Engineers Monday by apologizing for being late."This sounds like namedropping," he said, "but I was in a meeting in Washington with Jimmy Carter and Jim Baker."Holt, whose talk was titled "Standing Up for Science," voiced his "disappointment in the way that the administration has politicized" scientific issues from the teaching of evolution to stem cell research.Holt, who worked as the assistant director of the Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory for nine years, said there was a "growing crisis" in the country's understanding and appreciation of science, characterizing the lack of appreciation for research as "disturbing."He said he was "appalled" by President Bush's recent endorsement of the teaching of the theory of intelligent design ? which posits that the existence of a higher being, rather than natural selection, is responsible for biological diversity ? in public schools alongside the Darwinian theory of evolution."Public school science classes are not the place to be teaching things that cannot be tested empirically and verifiably," he said.