"In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth."

Ten English words. Six in Hebrew. The basics of creation.

No gauntlet thrown down to science. No polemic against anyone who dares to challenge current thinking on life's development. (The original challenge of Genesis 1 was to other ancient religions.)

The words form a statement of faith, not a scientific theorem or principle.

Yet, here we are, three millennia since the words were put on papyrus, and "enlightened generations" are engaged in political and judicial warfare.

Two weeks ago , a federal judge ruled that a Pennsylvania public school district could not teach intelligent design — a belief that the origins of life are better explained by an intelligent cause than by natural selection — in a biology class.

In November, the state Board of Education in Kansas adopted new science standards for public schools that treat evolution as a flawed theory.

Neither ruling has quelled the debate over the origins of life. It's just as nasty and confrontational as ever.

So, who's at fault?

It's easy to blame so-called fundamentalists who have a literal view of the Genesis story. How can they believe something that clearly is written in a style more akin to poetry than to a scientific textbook?

Yet, they are entitled to profess: In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. And I join them in such a profession. The public school classroom, however, is not the place to do it, whether under the guise of religion or science. The constructs of science don't allow statements of religion.

But ... fault also lies with science.

Science cannot arbitrarily conclude that the origin of life is explained naturalistically. Assertions that life started from a single cell, or from some other natural occurrence, puts science on the same playing field with religion.

How so? Because a science that asserts naturalistic origins to life is professing belief without sufficient evidence. By its own standards, it must leave the door open to other possibilities.

As the American Anthropological Association states: "Science describes and explains the natural world: it does not prove or disprove beliefs about the supernatural."

To its detriment, science becomes ideology when it tries to describe what cannot be deduced from empirical evidence. When it crosses that line, it becomes an advocate for a point of view.

Likewise, religion becomes ideology when it seeks to control every element of human inquisitiveness and force it to conform to a particular theology.

I bring up these troubling issues knowing that scientists and theologians can pick apart every argument for and against evolution and creation. I say, have at it.

My attempt is to raise caution flags for those who become so obsessed by their arguments that they forget their discipline's primary principles.

Is it too much to ask that science and religious ideologues lower their guns and get back to basics?

I hope not.