As we noted in early February, Florida State Sen. Stephen Wise (R) intends to require the teaching of “intelligent design”, even though he knows it will cost Florida a lot of money when it’s legally challenged.

State Sen. Stephen Wise, a Jacksonville Republican, said he plans to introduce a bill to require teachers who teach evolution to also discuss the idea of intelligent design. …

Wise, the chief sponsor of the bill, expects the Senate to take it up when it meets in March. He said its intent is simple: “If you’re going to teach evolution, then you have to teach the other side so you can have critical thinking.”

Wise acknowledges it’s a controversial subject. “I got a lot of hate mail last year,” he said. “You’d think I’d never gone to school, that I was Cro-Magnon man, that I just got out of a cave or something.”

This week State Sen. Wise filed his Antievolution legislation in Florida.

Senate Bill 2396 (PDF), filed on February 27, 2009, would, if enacted, amend a section of Florida law to require “[a] thorough presentation and critical analysis of the scientific theory of evolution.” The bill is sponsored by Stephen R. Wise (R-District 5), who was in the news earlier in February when he announced his intention to introduce a bill requiring “intelligent design” to be taught in Florida’s public schools. “If you’re going to teach evolution, then you have to teach the other side so you can have critical thinking,” he told the Jacksonville Times-Union (February 8, 2009). Wise acknowledged that his bill was likely to invite a legal challenge, but contended, “Someplace along the line you’ve got to be able to make a value judgment of what it is you think is the appropriate thing.” Evidently he changed his mind about how to accomplish his goal, since “intelligent design” is not mentioned in the bill.

But the phrase “[a] thorough presentation and critical analysis of the scientific theory of evolution” is familiar from the previous legislative session in Florida. House Bill 1483, which originally purported to protect the right of teachers to “objectively present scientific information relevant to the full range of scientific views regarding biological and chemical evolution,” was eventually amended — due to concerns about its constitutionality — to require the public schools to provide “[a] thorough presentation and critical analysis of the scientific theory of evolution.” Challenged to justify the measure, its sponsor Alan Hays (R-District 25) claimed that it was necessary to protect teachers seeking to “provide a critical analysis” of evolution, although the St. Petersburg Times (March 6, 2008) reported that it was unable to substantiate any claims of persecution.