Holy war, not reasoned debate
May 14th 2005Wallabynerd alert
The latest C&E News has an article on a recent meeting in DC (the 30th AAAS Forum on Science & Technology Policy). Most of the article was about how the evil federal government is cutting (or not increasing) funding to NSF, DOE, and other federal agencies for basic research. (Predictably, the AAAS thinks basic research should be a much higher priority than it has been.) One of the other topics was science education, which was definitely the more interesting part of the article.
I’m not sure whether it was the reporter who wrote the article, or the people who were actually giving the talks at the conference. Either way, there was some definite ambiguity in how the term “science” was used. Science, of course, can mean either a process for evaluating knowledge gained by experiment, or the body of knowledge gained by that process. And yet Lawrence Krauss (chair of the physics department at Case Western Reserve) apparently suggested that
Those individuals against the teaching of evolution in schools prey on the poor understanding of the public about the nature of scientific uncertainties…. They focus on these uncertainties to create doubt.
And so, then, “these attacks on evolution … are really attacks on science”.
It’s not at all clear which sense of “science” is meant here. I’m sure he can’t really mean that evolution is a part of the scientific method. And there’s a huge amount of “the body of knowledge” that has no need of evolution as an explanatory tool, so that’s not being attacked. The problem is that evolution has become a sacred cow, or rather a blanket explanation shaped like a magic wand. Note that this isn’t saying that “evolution” is wrong, just that it’s wrong — and *antiscientific* — to place evolution, or any other part of “science” (as body of knowledge), in a special box of things that can’t be questioned.
If the modern idea of evolution (or some variant on it) really is a correct and satisfactory explanation for how human life came about, then it will stand up to questioning, and debate, and experimentation… in the same way that gravity did, and in the same way that the idea that the planets orbit the sun rather than the Earth. (Of course, if it’s *not* a correct explanation, then it’ll just have to go the way of geocentrism, phlogiston, and “the ether”.)
One popular tactic for the staunch “evolution as science” crowd is to lump together everyone who disagrees with them — if you question evolution, then you must be some sort of scary wild-eyed fundamentalist nutjob. Now, perhaps there are people who don’t want kids to be taught the basics of the scientific method. (I’ve actually heard of such, but the friend from upstate New York who described them was very vague on the details.) Dr. Krauss liked this tactic just fine: “Specifically, he and others said, it must be made clear that one doesn’t have to be an atheist to recognize evolution,” because of course the only objections to “evolution as science” are religious. (Ironic that this assumed attitude of the stereotypical “skeptic of evolution” — “can’t question can’t think must accept this or the whole belief system comes crashing down on us” — describes equally well the attitude of the stereotypical “defender of evolution”. Thus, holy war between the “defenders” and the “attackers”.)
I’m quite sure that proponents of intelligent design *do* want schoolchildren to teach rigorous application of the scientific method. I’m quite sure that the recent attempts in Kansas to revamp the biology books to describe evolution as “one explanation” really do support the scientific method. I’m quite sure that even critics of evolution whose motivation is clearly (at least in part) religious really do support the scientific method.
I have my doubts about the AAAS and the National Academy, and anyone else for whom “evolution” is too fundamental to examine.
8 Responses to “Holy war, not reasoned debate”
Ed Darrell on 04 Jul 2005 at 2:44 pm #
Evolution requires examination — that’s one of the key points of the AAAS and NAS, and NSF, and NIH, and all other science agencies.
“Intelligent design” offers no such examination. That’s the problem.
Here’s one way to tell: In good science, a solid answer produces more questions, not fewer. Darwin’s observation of evolution produced thousands of questions (Why don’t the new attributes “blend” away? How can a unique attribute stay in a population if most of the members don’t have it? What prompts mutations? to mention a few).
What question is suggested by ID, other than “Who is the designer, and where is she?”
Wallaby on 05 Jul 2005 at 3:07 pm #
Evolution requires examination, yes. Every scientific theory does, and those that really are solid will stand up to it. Part of that examination is looking for alternate explanations.
The problem isn’t that the AAAS and NAS are recommending that evolution be examined. Rather, they’re urging the opposite — saying that it’s “bad science” to examine the basics of evolutionary thought. Sure, they’ll support work, and the NSF/NIH will fund work, that refines the details, or seeks to explain some new discovery in evolutionary terms. But they very definitely don’t want schools to teach students to question that evolution happened. And this isn’t just opposition to the straw-man spectacle of a school teaching only young-earth creationism, either: They object to stickers being placed on textbooks that urge students to think critically about evolution. The NAS doesn’t want students to think critically about evolution.
This is an attitude that seems more characteristic of the popular stereotype of religious dogmatism — “how dare you question our beliefs? you’ll never publish in this journal again!” (Which, after all, is worse than burning at the stake.)
I can understand that individuals may get bored with people saying “are you really *really* sure? what about…?” — but to make stamping out dissent and critical thought a national priority seems decidedly *anti* science.
This attitude is a problem regardless of whether or not evolution is true, or whether intelligent design is “good science” or not because it turns scientific discussion into what the NAS purports to try to avoid — religious debate.
Ed Darrell on 06 Jul 2005 at 7:33 am #
AAAS invites careful and hard examination of evolution theory. As I pointed out, the problem with ID is that it offers no examination at all, really — especially of the type scientists do.
The attitude of ID apologists, that ID should be considered science though there is not a single lab working the stuff anywhere in the world, is simply arrogant and wrong. There is no royal road to geometry, some wag warned a pharoah once. There is no royal road to biology, either, and ID isn’t the science of the pharoahs, either.
I sometimes wonder if it isn’t the science of the pharisees, however.
Would you be as concerned were the AAAS to warn against astrology in physics classes? What’s the difference between astrology and intelligent design, other than the fact that astrology has a lot more research to back it up?
I’ve often observed that there is no lobby to teach cold fusion. Why is that relevant? Cold fusion has hard lab results to back it up, about 100 times more stuff than ID. If ID is meritorious, cold fusion is the wave of the future and the hope of our civilization.
Wallaby on 06 Jul 2005 at 9:18 am #
I’m less familiar with the specific policies of the AAAS. In a (very brief) glance through their website I see nothing that suggests support for teaching any critique of evolutionary thought in public schools.
My purpose in all this isn’t really to defend ID, and you’ve already found other sites to argue with those who do that.
The basic problem, in this particular discussion and in general, with those criticizing ID (from “without”… i.e., defending “evolution”) is that they confuse experimental support for the (testable) hypothesis that random mutations happen, with experimental support for the (untestable) hypothesis that billions of years of random mutations are sufficient to explain life today. (I’ll call the second part of this “Evolution”, to distinguish.)
It’s Evolution-as-scientific-fact that the AAAS (etc.) defend as dogma, while pretending that the parents, teachers, and scientists who suggested that students be urged to “carefully consider” Evolution are really attacking evolution (small ‘e’). It’s Evolution that is described as “theory, not fact”; it’s evolution that is defended as supported by facts.
ID doesn’t (necessarily) deny the first, but does object to the second. It presents a hypothesis that random mutations were not sufficient, and that some sort of design was required to produce the complexity of life today. Some have proposed experiments that could be done to prove design: for instance, looking for some sort of message, in the form of complex specified information; or looking for examples of structures or organisms which arose suddenly and without continuity with previous forms. (MikeGene has a nice summary of such testing, including examples of tests proposed by scientists skeptical of ID.)
In slightly different terms, both Evolution and ID are explanations of origins, which are past events… history or pre-history, if you will… and therefore outside of (or perhaps just barely within) the limits of experimental science.
So that’s the difference between astrology and ID, to clear that up — one is a hypothesis that the stars currently have some effect on individual people (testable, at least in theory) and the other is a hypothesis about how life came into being (not currently testable, any more so than other hypotheses about how life came into being). Cold fusion makes no attempt whatsoever to explain events that happened a billion years ago.
And yes, I’d be equally concerned if the AAAS starts warning against astrology, *if* that warning is done simply on the grounds that “this doesn’t fit into the way that we, the establishment, believe the universe works”. Debunking it as experimentally disproven? that’s perfectly fine.
So, go ahead…. let those who defend Evolution do an experiment in which chemicals spontaneously and randomly develop into organisms which uninvolved biologists can agree are cells. Is there a single lab working this stuff anywhere in the world? I sure hope so, ’cause clearly it’s Not Science without that.
Ed Darrell on 08 Jul 2005 at 6:53 pm #
There is no part of evolution theory that is not backed by a lot of experimental results, or by historical observations in the field, or by both.
AAAS warns against ID because it is not backed by data — not by lab experiments, not by field observations. It makes claims against observations that do exist, but it presents no contrary data of its own.
It’s as if someone claimed that Einstein’s religious bias makes the Special Theory of Relativity false — but then offers no experimental suggestion and no data to suggest any error. Should such a claim be taught in high schools?
Or should it be put in the trashcan?
Rational and honest people vote for the trashcan on such ideas. And so it should be with ID, unless and until ID is backed in some way by real observations.
Wallaby on 09 Jul 2005 at 2:50 pm #
Yes yes. You’ve been saying that consistently for a week now here, and months (or longer) elsewhere. I guess we’ll just pack up and go home now. Mostly because there’s not much point in a “discussion” in which one person consistently misses the point of what the other person is getting at. One last response and I’m done.
“Evolution theory” claims that simple life evolved from inorganic chemicals billions of years ago. This is not something that science is able to test. Science *can* test whether some combination of inorganic chemicals can, in the right environment, react to form simple organic compounds, and whether, given time, those simple organic compounds can organize into structures resembling some sort of life. Science has, in fact, already done experiments along these lines. Even supposing that the conditions of these experiments are actually the same as those which would (in the establishment model) have existed on Earth at that time, demonstrating that something *can* happen does not mean that it *did* happen.
For instance, it’s entirely possible that I went out and killed someone last night. Science can demonstrate that I’d be physically able to, or point to examples of cases in which adult humans have killed other people. That’s pretty shaky evidence to present in court, though, because the law — unlike far too many “rational and honest” scientists — recognizes the difference between “can”, “might have”, and “did”.
“Evolution theory” (in the broad sense — “capital E evolution”, the sense that ID criticizes) offers a whole lot of “might have”, a tiny bit of “can”, and no hope of “did”.
Ed Darrell on 11 Jul 2005 at 12:03 am #
Am I repeating? Perhaps it’s because there appears little learning on the other side.
No, evolution theory makes no claim at all about abiogenesis. Evolution deals with how lifen diversifies, once it got started. How life got started makes no difference to the theory: Whether life started from a supernatural entity “breathing” life into forms, as Darwin posited, or whether it was seeded by aliens, as the Discovery Institute argues it may have been, or whether it rose spontaneously, as much evidence suggests. Evolution isn’t about the origins of life.
Can ideas about abiogenesis be tested? Yes, and the results have been spectacular. Stanley Miller’s experiments got complex hydrocarbons, and a few amino acids. Sidney Fox’s experiments got cells that do everything any living thing does.
Evolution theory is a whole lot of “here’s the concrete stuff.” Evolution theory is more solid than gravity theory at the moment, and has been for 100 years. We can even manipulate evolution, and we’re still just figuring exactly how gravitons work, with no hope yet of ever manipulating them.
But of course, one would have to have studied a bit of evolution and accurately describe it, to make such a statement.
Evolution theory today heals people and feeds people. Claims that it has serious problems are greatly exaggerated.
Wallaby on 11 Jul 2005 at 1:06 am #
Fine. When the AAAS etc. stop defending public school textbooks which preach abiogenesis as an integral part of evolution, when luminaries such as Dawkins stop filling up their books with speculation in the absence of knowable facts, when explanations of how specific structures came into being aren’t based on “it can be supposed that there was a significant advantage to the intermediate forms that we assume, and therefore this intermediate form evidently arose”… then science can get back to doing actual research.
This argument isn’t about attacking (or defending) the existence of random mutation, or the demonstrated fact that such mutations do introduce new characteristics (i.e., “how life diversifies”). I specifically denied that I was objecting to such “microevolution”.
But that’s the easy argument: I don’t accept all of it without question, therefore I must be attacking the bits that I’ve actually done experiments myself that confirm. It does take a bit of study to sort out the various “levels” of what the umbrella term “evolution theory” covers, although I’d hoped that I’d made it plain enough exactly which scope I’ve been objecting to the AAAS for defending, and which I’ve been willing to assume, at least for the sake of argument, as defensible.
Certainly the AAAS objects to students being urged to think about the evidence for “evolution theory”. (Hard to put much weight in your earlier assertion that “AAAS invites careful and hard examination of evolution theory” when you haven’t offered specifics of how they do encourage schoolchildren to think about whether the evidence makes sense or not.)
Such objection is sort of silly — granted, the stickers themselves may be silly; the parents who suggested them may even have been religiously motivated. One may well say that it’d be more reasonable to warn students that our understanding of gravity is incomplete. But if “evolution theory” is correct, then it’s not going to be dismantled by a bunch of 10th-graders, and the AAAS has nothing to worry about if students do “consider carefully”.
In the meantime, and since we can’t seem to agree on what “we” actually mean by “evolution” today…. there doesn’t seem to be much point in continuing to shed more heat than light on each other. If you’re determined to keep critiquing slipshod thinking among scientists wooly-headed enough to doubt Dawkins, I’m sure there’s plenty of other sites to amuse you. This one’s closed.