Resignations and Religion
The media has worked itself into a frenzy over the resignation of Prof Michael Reiss the director of education at the Royal Society in a row over creationism.
On iPM we're interested in that - but we're also interested in a row that has lead to another resignation, that of Gary Arthur who worked for 9 months as an attendant at the Abington Park Museum.
At the end of August there were protests outside the museum after it emerged that a paragraph in some text accompanying a display about Charles Darwin had been covered over. The allegation from secularist groups was that this had happened because of pressure from a creationist. The protests attracted significant attention on line - not just because of the participation of Alan Moore the writer of Watchmen and V for Vendetta. You can hear Alan Moore talk about why he felt it important to participate, and his views on evolution and religion in the player below:
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But some felt the story wasn't as clear cut as it first seemed and that this perhaps wasn't the right battle for those opposing creationism to pick. The council maintain that the sign was covered up simply because of factual errors in the text. Here's what they told me.
In 2003, a member of the public complained about [...] the conflation of Genesis and the theory of evolution. The officer responsible agreed that the phrase was inaccurate and confusing but on strictly factual (as opposed to religious) grounds (i.e. Genesis, as presented in the bible, does NOT include a 'view on evolution'.) The complainant's personal beliefs had no bearing on the way the complaint was approached.
Solely on the basis that it was factualy incorrect, we agreed to correct the text.
The panel remained covered over for the next five years in the hope that additional funds would be made available that would enable it to be replaced.
But museum attendant Gary Arthur who first sparked the row wasn't happy with the council's version of events. While he accepts that the sign was inaccurate and he thinks that reflects badly on the museum, he believes the religious beliefs of the complainant were a factor in the decision to cover up the sign.
Well it was Louis Houston, a local resident who made the complaint back in 2003. He feels he's been subjected to ad hominem criticism, and that his complaint was entirely legitimate. He does hold creationist views, which he is quite open about, you can hear those in the interview below.
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The sign is no longer covered up as it has now been amended. You can see the original paragraph and the amended version below the fold. The last word on this case, goes to the leader of the council. Tony Woods: "Evolution is science, creation is faith. It is disappointing that various groups jumped on a minor factual error in a relatively old museum display to promote their own views."
There's no denying that, as in the Reiss resignation, this has been an issue where passions ran high. So we decided to bring together Reverend Professor Alister McGrath, a theologian and scientist at King's College London, and Professor Christopher Higgins, a molecular biologist and geneticist who strongly agrees with the Royal Society decision over Prof Reiss's resignation. Can there be meaningful dialogue between scientists and creationists over the subject of evolution?
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Changes tp the sign.
Original panel text (incorrect phrase in bold):
He used the same layers of fossils that had supported the Genesis view of evolution to show the slow changes that are taking place over the millennia of earth history, each small change enabling a species to the rigours of it's environment - the struggle for survival, through the natural selection, leading to the survival of the fittest.
Revised text now on display:
He used the same layers of fossils to show the slow changes that are taking place over the millennia of earth history, each small change enabling a species to the rigours of its environment - the struggle for survival, through the natural selection, leading to the survival of the fittest.
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This is a wonderful debate but who knows where to start? Physics and god are surely the two most important of all subjects.
The physicists tell us the universe is about fourteen billion years old. Many biblical teachers say that a day according to the god of the Bible is like a thousand years to God. Already we are confused.
In Genesis, the Bible tells us God breathed Man's spirit into the nostrils of Man after having made him from the dust of the earth.
The dust of the earth is about one hundred and twenty-odd basic elements and gases. These elements are mixed in zillions of permutations to produce the dust. And then held together by, gravity and perhaps (?) superstring theory.
But we are told God's time-span for man is six thousand years. The Jewish calendar has just started year five thousand something.
I'm fascinated - and dismayed - that you can lose your job by engaging in this wonderful debate.
And what if you believe in god but not the god of the Bible?
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It's about being right or being wrong. The two ideas are diametrically opposed, and as such, polarization is inevitable.
There really isn't a problem except when people want to run with the hare and run with the hounds.
The pseudo-solution of being 'open minded', is an appeal to the incongruence of having your cake and eating it; it's the special pleading of middle-class spoilt brats, who want their choice without fighting for it.
Dawkins is right about the delusional status of religion; and those who believe that science and religion should enter debate on equal terms, simple misunderstand the inherent incompatibility. It's not comparing apples with bananas, it's comparing light with dark; one compromises the other.
So yes to polarization; and no to 'open minded' debate.
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As a secondary school science teacher I am very concerned about the way we teach science. I think we do little to explore its philosophy or sociology. Our children learn science as a set of knowledge and skills. Experiments are used in teaching to illustrate the knowledge being taught and to train children in its skills and methods.
I learnt my university science at Imperial College of Science, Technology and Medicine. Even here science was taught to exams and no sense of history or philosophy was included unless to make more interesting the knowledge being lectured.
The novelist H.G.Wells went to Imperial to learn science as a teacher. He destroys it, by having the first ever aeroplane crash into it in his short story, Argonauts of the Air. The ruins were a monument to the businessman and mechanic who made this historic flight! Wells thought the college was a place of cramming and lacked time and space for imagination, understanding or open debate.
The question of the place of creationism in our science classes raises the issue of the nature of science. It is about time that we discussed the nature of science in our teaching... once this happens the debate should become far clearer and creationism will be seen to be irrelevant to modern science.
And more importantly we will have a sense of the importance of seeking truth - something Jacob Bronowski, in his TV series, Ascent of Man, claims is one of the humanising values that can help prevent Auschwitz and Hisroshima.
From a science teacher who lost his state school job because of his agnostic beliefs and his protest against the blasphemy laws...
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Reverend Professor Alister McGrath and Professor Christopher Higgins were clearly attempting to pour oil on troubled waters by saying that the passionate and sometimes intemperate debate between creationists and scientists was being conducted by extremists. This is so not the point! Rational people at all levels are fighting a war in America and, increasingly it seems here in the UK, with an anti-science movement consisting not only of fundamentalists or extremists but also the large majority of religious conservatives.
Creationism cannot be debated in science classes, because it is not science and neither is the so-called 'intelligent design'. Discuss these in religious education or in theology lessons by all means. You can also discuss angels, cherubim, transubstantiation, resurrection and all the other paraphernalia. Offer one of these concepts to a scientist and she will be perfectly happy to investigate it. And, as the scientist will be the first to admit, just because she cannot find it or prove it, it doesn't mean that it doesn't exist. However, until she has a proof that has been exhaustively tried and tested over a period of over 200 years, like the extremely substantial theory of evolution, creationism and intelligent design must stay firmly in the realm of fairies, angels and demons. Not in the science curriculum of British schools!
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