COLUMBUS — A second draft of new state science standards, to be released April 1, takes a stronger stance on evolution by including a definition of science that advocates for “intelligent design” say would prevent the teaching of alternative ideas.

        “It says that all science deals with are natural processes. In other words, the natural world,” said Pat Barron, leader of the 41-member team writing the guidelines for what Ohio's schoolchildren should learn about science.

        The state Board of Education is struggling to rewrite the standards by year's end. Controversy erupted after the December release of the writing team's first draft; some board members complained it included evolution, but not alternative ideas.

        In the second draft, evolution remains the only explanation of how life developed. The definition of science includes the word “natural,” thereby eliminating supernatural possibilities.

        During a panel discussion before the school board Monday, prominent advocates for intelligent design, Seattle-based Discovery Institute fellows Stephen Meyer and Jonathan Wells, urged the board not to adopt a definition of science that would prevent the discussion of ideas they say are contrary to Charles Darwin's theory of natural selection.

        The writing team's life sciences subcommittee had already adopted, on Feb. 8, language that states: “Scientific knowledge is limited to natural explanations for natural phenomena (material world perceived by our senses or technological extensions).”

        “What that definition does — the purpose of it — is to exclude design theory,” said John Calvert, a Kansas lawyer and founder of the Intelligent Design Network, who has pushed for broader standards.

        The first draft has a more vague definition that does not include the word “natural.”

        Supporters of intelligent design argue that living things are too complex to have occurred through random genetic change and, therefore, must have been designed by some purposeful being. The nature of that being is not specified, but backers acknowledge it could have been a biblical God, supernatural or extraterrestrial.

        Critics of the concept argue that intelligent design is not science and that it is a disguise for creationism, which credits the origin of species to God and has been barred by courts from public schools. They say adding the word “natural” to the standards only reinforces that science by definition is the study of natural processes.

        Robert Lattimer, a writing team member who supports intelligent design and founded Ohio Citizens for Science Excellence, said he believed science needed to be defined and told that to his fellow team members.

        “But I didn't like what they came up with,” Mr. Lattimer said. “It eliminates other explanations for life at the outset.”

        Some writing team members did not believe the definition was needed because it's commonly understood that science operates under the limits of the natural world, said Scott Charlton, a science teacher at Lebanon High School who is on the writing team.

        However, he said, others wanted to provide a clear definition of what constitutes science and some wanted to keep nonscientific ideas, such as intelligent design, out of science classrooms.

        Jennifer Sheets, the board's president, noted that the standards still are in the draft stage and will be revised several more times.

        The writing team, made up of volunteers including science teachers and scientists, has indicated it is opposed to writing intelligent design into the standards. Some members have said they will resign if they are told to do so.

        Lynn Elfner, director of the Ohio Academy of Science, which supports evolution, said defining science as natural is redundant.

        “But it's probably needed in this case to clarify what we're talking about — science as opposed to supernatural phenomenon,” he said.

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