I got to thinking about the argument for teaching creationism in schools and how perhaps it might be useful. First, I should make clear that I am completely convinced that there is no scientific merit in creation ’science’ or so called intelligent design and consequently there is no room for it to be thought as if it were a science. There maybe room for teaching the argument that people want it in schools and telling students what creationist believe and explaining to them that there is no scientific method behind it. Notwithstanding the fact that I have just said that it is not science is there any room for teaching it in science class. I think there might be.
The scientific method is the most fundamental tool in a scientist’s arsenal it helps to ensure that he makes objective arguments rooted in reason and reality. Teaching this is an important part of any science curriculum and perhaps using creation as a case study for teaching the scientific method could be useful. Maybe we could provide the students with the rules for making scientific inquiry and ask them to apply it to creation and make an assessment of the veracity of creation within the context of the parameters of science then ask them to do the same to evolution.
Students can learn a lot about how science works by doing this they will learn what is considered science and how scientific conclusions are reached. Also hopefully it will shoe equip them with the skill to say that creation is not science.
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4 Comments
August 11, 2008 at 1:54 am
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August 11, 2008 at 8:01 pm
Good luck. Teaching ID/creationism as a bad example in science class would still give it the appearance of legitimacy that it craves. It would be better to use evolution as an example of how scioence operates, what a theory is, what evidence is, etc.
Even better would be to start with a non-controversial theory, such as gravitation. Then proceed to a science where we can’t do experiments in the lab, such as astronomy. Then lead into evolution.
With the increasing need for the public to evaluate scientific results and claims, I think a high-school class in general science would be worthwhile. A couple of years ago, the media grabbed a study on cancer rates by county, according to population. The media touted the result that counties with the least population also had a disproportionate share of low cancer rates. If you can tell me why a scientist would laugh at those stories even without knowing anything else about the study, then you don’t need such a course. Otherwise….
August 11, 2008 at 8:12 pm
I think you are right Ororin, I don’t think I was being completly bone fide in this post. What I really wanted to be achieved by doing this would be to show students how to undermine creation explicitly. I wanted to draw the lines for them and show them how bad it is. But you’re right it does raise a number of problems and I don’t think it’s worth it…I just really want to make it clear to students that creation is not science.
November 21, 2008 at 12:06 am
There are flaws in the study of evolution and the big bang theory as well, but this is treated as the gold standard in our creation.