The director of education at Britain’s Royal Society, Professor Michael Reiss, wants to open up British science classes to discussion of creationism.

He says that in his experience it is more effective to include discussion about creationism alongside scientific theories such as the Big Bang and evolution.

“An increasing percentage of children in the UK come from families that do not accept the scientific version of the history of the universe and the evolution of species.

“What are we to do with those children? My experience after having tried to teach biology for 20 years is if one simply gives the impression that such children are wrong, then they are not likely to learn much about the science that one really wants them to learn.”

The BBC will never say it outright, but that “increasing percentage” of children who won’t accept evolution are mostly from Muslim families; here’s an article at the Guardian by writer Usama Hasan, who argues that modern Muslims’ view of evolution must change.

Professor Richard Dawkins recently said that most Muslims were creationists, and their children are taught that the theory of evolution is wrong, which causes a huge problem in schools.

He’s largely correct, and the Muslim world desperately needs to debate the matter properly without fear, since science can neither prove nor disprove God. Whereas the Christian world, where Charles Darwin first proposed his thesis, has had a century and a half to come to terms with the theory of evolution, it has only begun to be taught rather recently in the Muslim world, where faith and religious practice is still relatively strong.

No wonder then that the theory is opposed by some religious elements, especially those that are ignorant of science. Snazzy websites, videos and books produced by fundamentalist Muslim “creationists” such as those at www.harunyahya.com, are obscuring clear scientific thinking.

Creation or evolution? Many believers in God have no problem with an obvious solution: that God created man via evolution. Here is some explanation of this view from a Muslim perspective.

Here we have a minister of the Church of England arguing for allowing creationism in schools, and a Muslim free thinker arguing against it.

Now, that’s whack.