How Embarrassing!

Submitted by Virge on Sat, Jan 31, 2004 - 00:47
in

And now a quote from John Rennie in Scientific American:

"Embarrassingly, in the 21st century, in the most scientifically advanced nation the world has ever known, creationists can still persuade politicians, judges and ordinary citizens that evolution is a flawed, poorly supported fantasy."

The irony of this situation is fascinating. There are three major political forces at work here (in my observation):

The religious fundamentalists who want to get evil evolution out of the education system because it is an anti-God conspiracy that holds the majority of scientists in blind ignorance. This group has managed to get Georgia Department of Education to propose science standards that eliminate all references to "evolution" in the curriculum.

The Intelligent Design group who want to get God into the education system. They hope to gain credibility by advocating that evolution is still taught along with its known deficiencies. And to show how "open minded" they are they want their intelligent design theory given an equal ranking with evolution (despite the fact that their whole platform rests on: "Here - look at this amazingly complex piece of biology that nobody can yet explain with evolution. If we can't explain it we have to acknowledge an intelligent super-being. QED").

The mainstream scientists who want an education system that doesn't close its eyes to complex problems and assign them to the supernatural.

We've seen what happens when countries let religion control their education systems, but I don't think it will come to that. I suspect there is enough free-thinking momentum in the US to steam-roll the latest anti-science wrinkle. I doubt it will create a lasting impediment, so I'm happy to think of it as entertainment to be viewed from a distance. (That is, until the Creationist Taliban starts to target Australian Schools.) It's like watching one of those sitcoms with an embarrassingly stupid protagonist. You know that in every episode you're going to be frustrated by the obvious mistakes he or she will make, but you watch it anyway.

Comments

Submitted by Rats (not verified) on Sat, Jan 31, 2004 - 02:49.

I was reading about that on Pharyngula, having completely missed it on the news. I must say, being an atheist, myself, and of a generally rational bent, I find the whole thing most distressing. I do hope you're right about it not being likely to last.