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March 16, 2005
You'll get tired of me moaning about creationists.
Monday's Washington Post piece on how generally crazy the church people aren't about teaching evolution raised my hackles enough. Pretty standard media piece, oversimplifications on both sides of the issue, several of the nouveaux-creationists look like loons, others look like fairly reasonable people with even more reasonable concerns, but overall a good piece that gets the tenor of the debate right.
I tend to be okay with talking about evolution as "mere theory", just as long as you put two things on the table: (1) it's the theory that's wound up at the center of pretty much everything in the structure of modern biology, so if it goes down a lot of other things go down like the proverbial house of cards; (2) there simply aren't any better scientific descriptions of how we got here. Yes, we as evangelical Christians have another idea, but we don't put that idea into any terms that have have any explaining power, and scientists love to do the explaining, so it's kind of hard to put those descriptions into the scientific classroom.
Whether you like it or not, we're kind of stuck with evolution. If you don't like it, work on a better theory - and make it scientific, not a "God of the gaps" idea. If you won't sack up and make the better theory, then get to understanding your Darwin real well, 'cause his stuff is what you're left with.
Of course, as I'm hacking around Technorati, I come across criticism that is a wee bit pointed:
This is a political battle to forcibly insert Christianity into everyone's lives.Don't think so?
Why aren't they trying to wage this fight of (supposedly) competing scientific theories among science professionals? Because they aren't doing science and they know it. They don't stand a chance within the professional literature because their work doesn't merit attention. Biological scientists know this and ignore their unscientific delusions. But that doesn't matter, because they want to indoctrinate children and win a political battle.
I'm not quite sure I'm there. I mean, I absolutely see the point - and there are absolutely creationists who want to remove this debate from science and put it into politics.
But to indoctrinate the masses? That's what I think gets missed all over the pike. There are kids in the world who buy into the idea that there is a God who created everything everywhere, and who came into this belief of their own free will. This is difficult to believe, but not all the kids in my church are there because Mom and Dad make them come - several even come without, just because they know that there is something important within the walls.
Evangelicals (not even just fundies, evangelicals across the board) are just as afraid of being indoctrinated with secularism as secularists are afraid of being indoctrinated with Christianity. This is what's behind this quote:
"It's an academic freedom proposal. What we would like to foment is a civil discussion about science. That falls right down the middle of the fairway of American pluralism," said the Discovery Institute's Stephen C. Meyer, who believes evolution alone cannot explain life's unfurling.
Of course, anti-[everything] (and I love that blog name, by the way, as you'll see in a moment) spins that quote a bit differently.
But it isn't an academic freedom issue and it isn't a science issue. If they want to discuss science, then let's see them do some science and submit it to the system of professional peer review that all other scientific research goes through. Let's see them submit their argument to professional scrutiny to see if has merit. They won't do this, because there is no merit to their arguments. That is why they submit their debate to school boards, politicians and others unqualified to comment on the scientific merits of anything. Sorry if that sounds elitist but it's the truth.
There is a second reason to go to school boards, though - and you may feel free to argue that this is a bull reason, but you have to admit that it's there. Christian parents want to defend their kids against indoctrination that God didn't create the world. They don't want their kids to get confused about one of the central tenets of their faith and forsake their faith while young because their teacher effectively tells them they're wrong to believe it.
Which, honestly, is their right. You may feel free to say that shielding the kids from knowledge isn't wise. You're probably right to say that. But you can't take that right away from Mom and Dad.
Of course, I read this (and several other posts just like it linked from Technorati and I'm really thinking that there has to be somebody coming at this from the other side. Root a bit, and I hit the mother lode - somebody from the Discovery Institute complaining that they were misquoted or notquoted in the original piece. (Memo to these people at evolutionnews.org - get yer PHP fixed, every time and every different means I try to get to the permalink, it comes back broken.) Unfortunately, because the link is broken, I can't get to the full content of the complaint, but apparently because the issue didn't get spun exactly the way the Discovery Institute wanted it, the Post has committed one-sided reporting.
Here's my bottom line: EVERYBODY IS WRONG. Evangelicals are wrong for fighting evolution teaching in the classrooms in the absence of any better scientific explanations. Scientific establishment is wrong because they consistently and arrogantly fail to listen to the complaints of evangelicals concerning the bias in curriculum and the failure to acknowledge that there are other ways of knowing, not just scientific ways of knowing. Until a point where we can actually start talking to one another and not past one another, this debate is going to progressively get more heated and more bitter.
Yay.
(I'll follow up on this if the Discovery Institute people ever get their act together.)
Posted by Chuck at March 16, 2005 04:09 PM
Comments
I ran across your blog.
You make some good points above, but I would just like to point out something.
"Scientific establishment is wrong because they consistently and arrogantly fail to listen to the complaints of evangelicals concerning the bias in curriculum and the failure to acknowledge that there are other ways of knowing, not just scientific ways of knowing."
This sentence is wrong. Basis in facts and evidence (science) is the only way to definitively know something. Religion can certainly be taught in school, but don't let it be taught as fact, study it as it is. Religion, like all mythologies, are just ideas that have been created to promote social stability in the abscence of knowledge. They should be taught as such. If in biology a student states that god created man, he should be counted wrong, because that is just what (one recent) religion says, and has no basis in fact.
Much like vestigial limb bones in snakes, I believe that eventually religion will go away. I hope so, because it certainly isnt helping now. Look at most of the wars in the world right now.
Posted by: Jeff at March 16, 2005 06:15 PM
Heh. I'm almost inclined to agree with the guy "Jeff" that just posted that note, but because he's talking like an @$$, I think I'll bring up a different point. I don't see why this is a big deal. I went through public schools where science was taught. There was an opportunity for parents to pull their children from our biology class during the few weeks that evolution was taught. Those students went to the library to read. And it’s funny because the only person that I think left during that part of class was a student from India that wasn't even Christian. While evolution took up most of that module, other "theories" were taught and nothing said one of them was right or has even moved past being a theory. So what's the problem again?
The previous noter had some issues with the whole "knowing" thing... But, for example I know what is morally right and wrong with out science having to prove it. Or I could take a different stance and ask how do you KNOW science is right? Existence as a whole could just be a figment of your imagination. :) fun times.
Posted by: nancy at March 16, 2005 07:32 PM
Hey Dr. Chuck. I couldn't find your trackback. I posted something about your post & comments. Enjoyed your post. Take it easy. a-[e]
Posted by: a-[e] at March 16, 2005 10:31 PM
i might just go and hide in a hole and cry now. i really just might. this whole piece of shit, this debate, this problem, this close-mindedness on ALL SIDES has got me sick to my stomach, and I really don't know how much more I can take. It's shit like this that makes me want to remove myself from religion AND academia forever. And neither do I truly want to do, because those are the two places I find source for inspiration and a reason to continue living. But Jesus H. Christ (or Siddhartha Q. Gautama, or Mother F. Goddess, or whatever)! Can we please, please, PLEASE in the name of ALL THINGS HOLY (whether you believe in them or not! no matter what incarnation!) have some respect for other people and their beliefs? Can we maybe have a debate about tolerance, and not who is right and who is going to hell? Can we please, please, just once accept that it's okay that we don't all believe the same damned thing, and maybe just teach, in an unbiased format, all ways of knowing, leaving the student to decide which has the most resonance? Please?
But no. Humans just have to muck things up, just like this. And it makes me sick.
Posted by: Catie at March 16, 2005 11:21 PM
Question about this subject and re: a radio show I heard. Essentially this guy was saying that the current evolutionary model (ie no divine creation) is flawed because the current fossil record of plants supports a creationist viewpoint than an evolutionary one. He cites a book which says that the fossil record ofplants does not show nearly as many common ancestors as the animal species do. I tuned in at the end of this broadcast so I missed most of the important parts and was wondering if people would perk up and point me into the right directions.
(Also playing a bit of devils advocate for the purposes of academics)
Summers
Posted by: Summers Pittman at March 21, 2005 01:46 AM
I think you really hit the mark when you said that the center of the evolution "debate" is fear as in the evangelist fear that their children will become "secular" if they dare to pay attention in biology class.
I, however, am not sure if science has an obligation to acknowledge that there are other ways of "knowing." Does that mean every time a biologist goes over a lesson of mitosis and meiosis that they have to also have to add the caveat that there's the possibility it's all just a bunch of baloney and the result of ID?
If you have a kid in your class who's 25 percent Navajo, does that mean you'd have to recognize the Navajo creation myth as well as the Bible's Creation story?
Science class, in public schools anyway, should just cover science. If parents don't want their kids exposed to those secularist theories, then send the tykes to a Christian school (just as long as I as a taxpayer don't have to pay for it).
As an aside, I wonder how many creationists get their flu vaccine last fall? If they were really sticking to their guns, they should have left the flu shots for the people who actually believe in the science behind them.
Posted by: MTD at July 5, 2005 04:12 PM