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The pressure from US religious groups to unseat the teaching of evolution as the sole construct in public schools shows no sign of slowing. In Georgia, Alabama, and Pennsylvania, as well as other states, individual school districts and state governments are grappling with suggestions that creationism be taught along with evolution. And the movement appears to be a new US export.

Across the Atlantic, those in charge of Britain's education system have been facing their own version of the God versus Darwin debate, albeit on a much smaller scale. For the past three years, a small group of schools in northeast England have been at the center of the controversy about teaching creationism. The schools, established under a government scheme that allows private benefactors to operate state schools, are run by the Emmanuel Schools Foundation, which is backed by the millionaire car dealer Peter Vardy.

For its part, the...

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