This book deals with professional creationist and anti-creationist organizations in America, and describes how the “conflict between science and religion” is the result of the interaction between these two groups. It retraces their history from the 1960s onwards, and identifies crucial turning points that led to new forms of creationism and anti-creationism. It explains their strategies, labels and arguments as effects of this history and structure. Taking a field theoretical approach, the book avoids problems of prior creationism research, making it possible to identify the mechanisms through which creationism generates new strategies, arguments, and media output. The field model is used as an interpretive tool to make sense of some of the most important creationist and anti-creationist publications and media statements.

Investigates how the Christian fundamentalist movement brings Creationism into the mainstream through a Kentucky museum In Creating the Creation Museum, Kathleen C. Oberlin shows us how the largest Creationist organization, Answers in Genesis (AiG), built a museum—which has had over three million visitors—to make its movement mainstream. She takes us behind the scenes, vividly bringing the museum to life by detailing its infamous exhibits on human fossils, dinosaur remains, and more. Drawing on over three years of research at the Creation Museum, where she was granted rare access to AiG’s leadership, Oberlin examines how the museum convincingly reframes scientific facts, such as modeling itself on traditional natural history museums. Through a unique historical dataset of over 1,000 internal documents from creationist organizations and an analysis of media coverage, Creating the Creation Museum shows how the museum works as a site of social movement activity and a place to contest the secular mainstream. Oberlin ultimately argues that the Creation Museum has real-world consequences in today’s polarized era.

Who should decide what children are taught in school? This question lies at the heart of the evolution-creation wars that have become a regular feature of the US political landscape. Ever since the 1925 Scopes 'monkey trial' many have argued that the people should decide by majority rule and through political institutions; others variously point to the federal courts, educational experts, or scientists as the ideal arbiter. Berkman and Plutzer illuminate who really controls the nation's classrooms. Based on their innovative survey of 926 high school biology teachers they show that the real power lies with individual educators who make critical decisions in their own classrooms. Broad teacher discretion sometimes leads to excellent instruction in evolution. But the authors also find evidence of strong creationist tendencies in America's public high schools. More generally, they find evidence of a systematic undermining of science and the scientific method in many classrooms.

The fascinating story of how and why all fifty American states were formed—and how they became a part of history’s greatest social experiment. Every US state has a unique history that deserves a separate book. The Creation of the American States provides readers with essential information on how each of the fifty states came into being. From the time of the first explorers and settlers to the present day, A. Ward Burian tells the story of how the America was established over the course of four hundred years. He examines what motivated brave souls to venture into an unknown wilderness and then delves into the time frame for each state’s discovery, settlement, and consolidation into the United States. With brief biographies interjected that spark human interest and provide perspective to what was taking place, The Creation of the American States shares a better understanding of how the North American continent was transformed from a wilderness into a powerful nation—state by state.

The adoption of the Bill of Rights was the last step in defining the essential elements of American constitutionalism. The process began with the writing of the Constitution, continued through its ratification by the states, and culminated with the adoption of the Bill of Rights. In 1991 the bicentennial of the adoption of the Bill of Rights provided an occasion for examining the origins of this most important statement of individual rights in American history. Published on this anniversary, The South's Role in the Creation of the Bill of Rights sheds light on the paradoxical part the South played in the process of drafting and adopting this document. In cogent essays from the Chancellor's Symposium on Southern History held at the University of Mississippi in 1988, six noted experts in legal, constitutional, and southern history fill a gap in the literature of southern legal history for the period 1787-1791. The southern role is particularly important because political leaders in the South took the lead in promoting a bill of rights and at the same time vociferously defended the right to hold slaves. The essays in this book comprise a complete discussion of the writing and ratification of the Constitution and the adoption of the Bill of Rights in five southern seaboard states. They reveal the interplay of a desire to protect states' rights, a concern for the preservation of individual liberty, and a defensive attitude toward slavery that governed southern attitudes. These concerns dominated constitutional discourse until the Civil War. The South's peculiar “cultural constitutionalism” was first given definition in this period of American history, and as this book reveals, it initiated the process of setting the region apart from the rest of the United States. The events of these years were a necessary first step in establishing a southern regional identity.

Considers (84) S. 1256, (84) S. 144, (84) S. 149, (84) S. 208, (84) S. 257, (84) S. 864, (84) S. 927, (84) S. 1045, (84) S. 1164, (84) S. 1470, (84) S. 1512, (84) S. 1634, (84) S. 2070, (84) S. 2173.

Winner of the Pulitzer Prize With deft portraits of many world figures, Dean Acheson analyzes the processes of policy making, the necessity for decision, and the role of power and initiative in matters of state. Acheson (1893–1971) was not only present at the creation of the postwar world, he was one of its chief architects. He joined the Department of State in 1941 as Assistant Secretary of State for Economic Affairs and, with brief intermissions, was continuously involved until 1953, when he left office as Secretary of State at the end of the Truman years. Throughout that time Acheson's was one of the most influential minds and strongest wills at work. It was a period that included World War II, the reconstruction of Europe, the Korean War, the development of nuclear power, the formation of the United Nations and NATO. It involved him at close quarters with a cast that starred Truman, Roosevelt, Churchill, de Gaulle, Marshall, MacArthur, Eisenhower, Attlee, Eden Bevin, Schuman, Dulles, de Gasperi, Adenauer, Yoshida, Vishinsky, and Molotov.

This revolutionary book proposes that the universe did not begin with a 'Big Bang' and that it is slowly converging to an equilibrium state. Key features of the book include: ? the modern model of the atom. ? How the Earth and Solar System formed. ? Evolution of life on Earth. ? Nucleosynthesis in stars. ? Recent changes in the Solar System. ? the various entities in the universe, including black holes, quasars and supernovas. ? the interstellar medium. ? the classical theory of relativity. ? Beunker's alternative theory of relativity. ? the Steady State Universe theory. ? the Big Bang theory of the universe is disproved. ? Redshift is caused by cosmic dust, not the Doppler Effect and an expanding universe. ? the universe is flat and infinite. ? Cosmic background radiation comes from the interstellar medium, not the Big Bang. ? Alternative scientific theories of the universe, including cyclic models. ? Religious and 'alien design' theories of creation. ? Were bacteria from space the first life on Earth? ? the new 'Evolving Universe' (towards equilibrium) model of the universe based on known changes in the last 10+ billion years. ? A simple proof of gravitational deflection of light. ? G.A. Mohr's large curvature correction for Finite Element Analysis. Industry and reader comment has included: "Some provocative and timely issues." "A huge topic."' the legendary John Argyris called G. A. Mohr "The greatest scientist in Australia."