I love science. I am consistently amazed at the intricacy, beauty, and strangeness of the universe as discovered by thousands of our fellow humans. As a hopeful future science educator, I want to share this wonder, as well as the benefits of understanding how nature works and also how science works. By extension, I would also like to demonstrate what is NOT science.
Pseudo-scientific ideas can range from the ridiculous to the dangerous. Flat Earthers and Geo-centrists are mocked because their beliefs are demonstrably false. UFOlogy and ghost hunting require a level of gullibility which is anathema to objective thinking. The anti-vaccination movement based upon fallacious results by a less than credible doctor has caused great damage to public health. All of these endeavors have one characteristic in common, that is they all strive to support a predetermined conclusion.
Science, however, is about pleasure of finding things out (borrowing from Richard Feynman) and “not knowing” can be the catalyst to discovery. This means that one must allow the evidence to lead to a conclusion, and even disprove a beloved hypothesis if it cannot be supported. This is the path to discovery. Creationism is not on the path to discovery, and falls into the same category as crypto-zoology and phlogiston theory.
Anyone who knows me at least understands that creationism is a bit of a pet peeve of mine. The truth is actually a bit more complicated. I hate creationism, not just because it is a lie presented as absolute truth to the gullible, but also because it is but one tool in a much broader and dangerous socio-political movement which has manifested in the United States. This ideology is Dominionism, which advocates a society and government based on Biblical principles, and utilizes divisive politics, demonization of opposition, and fear in order to achieve this goal. Creationist literature is full of such villainization, wherein evolution is linked to genocide, abortion, racism, and slavery. (Ironically, all these things existed millenia before Darwin was born, and all were not only mentioned, but advocated in the Bible.)
Some may object to this characterization, but before you protest, please understand that my high school education was an indoctrination, that is to say that I was removed from public school and placed into a sort of spiritual boot camp. It was a cult-like experience in which dissent from a literal interpretation of the Bible was discouraged, and Biblical literalism is the heart of the movement. This is why the collective discoveries humanity has made in the last 400 years are the focus of so much ire.
In the mind of a fundamentalist, like I was two decades ago, if the accuracy of any part of the Bible can be called into question, then all Bible is suspect. It must be either be all true, or all a lie. If God did not create the universe in six literal days, as stated in Genesis 1, then all is called into doubt, including the central salvation story. This is, of course, ludicrous. Most people believe in a god, and have no trouble with that faith and their acceptance of science. Many scientists do this as well, including well known Christians such as Kenneth Miller, Theodosius Dobzhansky, and Robert Bakker.
But science is seen as a threat to faith by the fundamentalist. Galileo and Kepler removed the Earth from its location in the center of the universe and discovered that the movements in the heavens follow natural laws. Darwin demonstrated that all life on Earth, including ourselves, is descended from a common ancestor. Hubble helped to give our universe an age, now known to be over 13 billion years. These discoveries are the threat because they directly contradict the Bible. Unlike Kepler, Darwin and Hubble, the creationists have already determined their conclusions and will attempt to shoehorn data to conform to their preferred beliefs. Any facts or ideas which do not conform to Biblical literacy must be discarded, and most professional creationists will proudly proclaim this fact. They have determined from the start their intellectual dishonesty and will continue to be dishonest in support of their apologetics.
Therefore, creationism is two things. First, it is pseudo-scientific endeavor which abuses science to deceive the scientifically illiterate. Secondly, and more importantly, creationism is a weapon of fear, falsely pitting people against each other.
No comments:
Post a Comment