The Alabama Baptist Online

Emory University accused of academic bullying comment (0)

May 31, 2012

ATLANTA — A renowned neurosurgeon, who received the Presidential Medal of Freedom and who successfully separated twins who were joined at the head, was the target of academic bullying recently at Emory University in Atlanta because he does not believe in evolution.

About 500 Emory faculty and students signed a letter to the editor of the university newspaper April 25 to call attention to commencement speaker Ben Carson’s “dismissal of evolution.” 

“The theory of evolution is as strongly supported as the theory of gravity and the theory that infectious diseases are caused by micro-organisms,” the letter said. “Dismissing evolution disregards the importance of science and critical thinking to society.”

The Discovery Institute launched a petition drive in response, with more than 2,700 signatures gathered within a week in support of Carson, who serves as professor of neurosurgery, oncology, plastic surgery and pediatrics at the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine. 

“We call upon Emory University to publicly reaffirm that the university community welcomes and honors invited commencement speaker Dr. Ben Carson,” the petition said. 

David Klinghoffer, a senior fellow at the Discovery Institute, said in seeking to cast Carson in an embarrassing light, the professors who wrote the letter to the editor “used the familiar tactic of attributing to Dr. Carson beliefs, patently foolish ones, he does not hold.”