Science education and the hand of God
There are some good letters in the NYT today in response to last week's article about creationist geologists touring the Grand Canyon (NYT, Oct. 6).
As usual when the creation/evolution debate makes it into the pages of the Times, the letters are eloquent, logical, and almost all written by college professors and Reform rabbis.
Ugh. By attempting to defeat the intelligent design argument through logic and reason, we approach it on its own terms and give it more weight than it deserves. I swear to God, if I read one more LTE from some professor trying to explain the definition of a "theory"...
The bigger problem here is that we shouldn't have to debate "evolution vs. intelligent design" within a scientific context at all. "Intelligent design" just doesn't hold any water as science. As theology or philosophy, it's fine, and we can and should debate it within that context.
The arguments that intelligent design proponents most frequently use to support their position are easily dismantled.* (You should Google around for critiques, but start with this article in Natural History.)
The fact that intelligent design has even managed to sell itself as science, or that anyone has to explain to the American public what a theory is, is symptomatic of a larger social problem. Perhaps one reason the intelligent design movement has any footing at all in our society is a huge failing of American schools to educate students properly both in the substance of modern biology, physics, and chemistry, and in the process of scientific evaluation of phenomena. If Americans had a solid grounding in these areas, we could focus less on whether intelligent design theory is good science, and more on the social and political heart of this debate.
*I am particularly fond of the "irreducible complexity" argument: "Wait, you're saying the eye could have evolved how? This seems way too complicated for me to even try to understand, so I'm going to assume God was responsible. You guys can stick around the lab if you want, but I'm going for a beer."
As usual when the creation/evolution debate makes it into the pages of the Times, the letters are eloquent, logical, and almost all written by college professors and Reform rabbis.
Ugh. By attempting to defeat the intelligent design argument through logic and reason, we approach it on its own terms and give it more weight than it deserves. I swear to God, if I read one more LTE from some professor trying to explain the definition of a "theory"...
The bigger problem here is that we shouldn't have to debate "evolution vs. intelligent design" within a scientific context at all. "Intelligent design" just doesn't hold any water as science. As theology or philosophy, it's fine, and we can and should debate it within that context.
The arguments that intelligent design proponents most frequently use to support their position are easily dismantled.* (You should Google around for critiques, but start with this article in Natural History.)
The fact that intelligent design has even managed to sell itself as science, or that anyone has to explain to the American public what a theory is, is symptomatic of a larger social problem. Perhaps one reason the intelligent design movement has any footing at all in our society is a huge failing of American schools to educate students properly both in the substance of modern biology, physics, and chemistry, and in the process of scientific evaluation of phenomena. If Americans had a solid grounding in these areas, we could focus less on whether intelligent design theory is good science, and more on the social and political heart of this debate.
*I am particularly fond of the "irreducible complexity" argument: "Wait, you're saying the eye could have evolved how? This seems way too complicated for me to even try to understand, so I'm going to assume God was responsible. You guys can stick around the lab if you want, but I'm going for a beer."
posted by Waage on Monday, October 10, 2005
1 Comments:
Too many dolts in America don't really know what science is, leading to this problem.
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