The teaching of creationism in public schools in the US is justifiable

"I used evolution as a means to justify why creationism should be taught in my thesis and there isn't anything irrelevant about it." I see what you're saying, but I still feel like it's not really a valid argument for this debate because this debate only regards creationism. Evolution will no doubt come up, but it is not a central point. "That's right, even things bordering on fact like gravity are accepted and not completely proven." That's a really existential viewpoint that is bordering on nonsensical. 2 2 = 4 every time. That is a provable fact. If you have two objects and then you get two more objects, there will be four objects. If you take sodium and react it with chlorine, it will produce Sodium Chloride. Now, I will agree that theories can't be proven, but they can be accepted. Like you mentioned, technically gravity can't be proven, but we all know it's true. "Con states that nearly all scientists reject creationism but we cannot exclude it from our education just because of that." Actually, we can and should. It would be hard to find a scientists that believe in a geocentric universe, but that used to be what people believed, and I'm sure you can still find people who believe it. Also, I'm sure there are people who reject the atomic theory, so should they teach that in schools. No doubt you've heard of the "Faith healers." They believe that we should not use medicine to heal ourselves and just pray instead. Should they teach that in health class? People believe it, even though scientists reject it. The idea that we should teach something even though scientists reject is is ludicrous at best. "Referring back to the chart, a whopping 44% believe that God created man in present form compared to a 14% believing that God had no part in the process." So, you take a poll of doctors, and they unanimously tell you that it's bad to smoke. Then you talk to random people on the street, many of whom are smokers. Who is going to give you a better response? The doctors, of course. They know what's good for your health. Honestly, I'm sure that, of those 44% of Americans, very few of them have an advanced degree in life or earth science. So, do you really think that it's appropriate to teach something that only a negligible number of experts accept? That's crazy, whether or not 44% of non-experts believe in it. "We can test the effectiveness of different tooth brushing techniques in an experiment while we cannot truly test the validity of creationism nor evolution." There is a ton of empirical evidence supporting evolution, and there is next to none supporting creationism. We can't unequivocally prove one or the other, but we can, and did, get really close to it. "See "extreme irrelevance."" It's actually not irrelevant at all. If you happened to read my argument, which, evidently, you did not, you would know that he was arguing exactly the same thing, and he made an excellent point. Please try again, and read the whole thing. "But we're not teaching scientists, are we?" But we're teaching people science. Since, arguably, the main point of school (and definitely a major point) is to equip future generations with the ability to find jobs, so technically, yes, we are teaching scientists. "People find creationism to be correct... follow where I'm going?" Yes and no. I understand what you're trying to say, but the reality is that we have really strong scientific theories that virtually every scientist agrees with. Why would we teach students what scientists reject? "Going back to what I just said, it doesn't hurt to provide a large spectrum to think across. In fact, all that does is help because it will probably make young minds more flexible." Yes, let's. And while we're at it, we need to also open their minds to the views of the Flat Earth society, Faith healers, Skinheads, and Neo-Nazis because it would open their mind. Now, I'm not trying to equate creationists with Nazism, but the point is, while open-mindedness should be encouraged, there are many views which should not be encouraged. The scientific evidence that we were all created by a divine being is about the same as the scientific evidence that Jews are inherently evil (I happen to be Jewish myself, and I'm only evil sometimes). Now, I understand that this argument could be interpreted as far-fetched, so I'd just like to quickly sum up the heart of it. We can encourage open-mindedness, but if something is universally rejected by experts, you can't justify teaching it at school. Essentially every life and earth scientist in the US rejects creationism as a scientific theory. In science class, they teach the scientific consensus, not what a plurality of society believes. Teaching creationism can no more be justified than teaching about a geocentric universe. Science is not an opinion. One can choose to reject science, because, as the bible states, humans have free will. One can believe what they want, but in science class, they teach science, and science has shown a resounding rejection of creationism. If the student chooses to reject what s/he learns in science class, that is their prerogative. I would like to thank my opponent for a most excellent debate, and I am looking forward to his final argument. However, he has attempted to justify the teaching of creationism in schools, but he has failed. This is not because he did a bad job debating, on the contrary, he was excellent, but it's just not possible to justify the teaching of creationism in schools. Therefore, vote CON. Thank you.