Sometimes I do incredibly stupid things, like writing about politics. This is one of those times.

I know this is a blog about biomedicine in Israel, and it might just be this is going to make some people angry. All the same, I’m going to write about the important stuff here. Because let’s face it: most of the readers of this blog live in Israel, work in Israel and love and care for their country (probably Israel). We all want Israel to keep on being a developed country, with a western lifestyle and an efficient healthcare system. I’m going to take for granted that we all agree on what we need to do to get there: we need to teach our children about science, so they can grow up into well-balanced and productive human beings. Unfortunately, Dr. Gabi Avital, an Aerospace Engineer and the Chief Scientist of the Education Ministry seems to take offense at these notions, acording to Ha’aretz.

“If textbooks state explicitly that human beings’ origins are to be found with monkeys, I would want students to pursue and grapple with other opinions. There are many people who don’t believe the evolutionary account is correct,” Avital said yesterday.

“There are those for whom evolution is a religion and are unwilling to hear about anything else. Part of my responsibility, in light of my position with the Education Ministry, is to examine textbooks and curricula,” he said. “If they keep writing in textbooks that the Earth is growing warmer because of carbon dioxide emissions, I’ll insist that isn’t the case.”

He doesn’t finish there. He also has an interesting insight on the scientific community, which he’s actually rather pleased at.

“Today I am pleased that more and more scientists engaged in pure science, rather than being employed in the name of an ideology, are reaching the conclusion that the world must have a master. Nothing is given to chance,” he said.

I wonder where he finds all those scientists who realized that the world must have a master. I don’t think he’s referring to Obama. Maybe He-Man? I’m really not sure.

I AM certain about thing, though. If this man stays in his current position as Chief Scientist of the Education Ministry, and actually turns his words into deeds, we’re in a heap of trouble. Children at a young age are highly impressionable, and school is meant to give them the education they need to develop into mature adults, some of which choose to go to the university and study subjects that will enable them to carry the industry forward. Schools are NOT meant to serve as ideological or religious breeding grounds, especially when those beliefs specifically contradict scientific facts. If we don’t teach our children to differentiate between religious belief and scientific fact, we might as well go and establish all this biomed community in another country, because in a decade or two Israel won’t be the same.