The scientist who said creationism should be discussed in science lessons has left his job at the Royal Society. Professor Michael Reiss stepped down yesterday as the Royal Society's director of education following remarks he made last week at the British Association for the Advancement of Science suggesting that creationism should be included in science lessons.

Why are we asking this now?

The Rhinos, runaway leaders of Super League all season, had their lead cut to a mere two points in a stormy match that saw their prop, Nick Scruton sent off for a spear tackle. It will suit the conspiracy theorists that that was one of a number of decisions by the St Helens-based referee, Steve Ganson, that went against them, but Leeds were to blame for their own loss of discipline in the second half.

The Independent's Great Art series

What a strangely mild and irrelevant title Christopher Hitchens chose for his potent and incisive polemic. And his quarrel is not with God, who doesn't exist, but with organised religion, which is "violent, irrational, intolerant, allied to racism and tribalism and bigotry, invested in ignorance and hostile to free enquiry, contemptuous of women and coercive towards children" and has "outgrown its usefulness".

At some point Glyn Maxwell's satire on the media and celebrity culture, told entirely in dialogue, must have seemed a good idea. That neither he nor his editor wised up to the sad truth of these poor pages constitutes a steely case of denial indeed.

Dillie Keane is no stranger to musing on female foibles in an ensemble situation, as her work with Fascinating Aida in the Eighties shows. Twenty years on, Grumpy Old Women requires Keane (with Linda Robson and Jenny Eclair) to dispense similarly withering remarks on fashion and food fads - except without musical accompaniment, and with a tone that's more end of the pier than Noel Coward.

Week of 6 February 2005

Sir: I agreed with Stephen Pollard's article "Pigs on a poster are the least of our worries" (31 January) until the end, when he made the extraordinary claim that "neo-con" is code for "imperialist Jew".

There's room for explaining both evolution and creationism

Tips for 2000: astro economists warn of a May meltdown, but industry experts say equities are heading higher

Aries