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GUEST EDITORIAL: Peter Johnston |
Why do
the Darwinists Want "Strengths and Weaknesses" Removed? Is
Evolution in its Final Phases?
[Ed. note:
Guest editorial by Peter Johnston, former candidate for the
State Board of Education. This article is reprinted by
permission of the Wharton
Journal-Spectator, where it originally appeared.]
This month the State Board of Education (SBOE) heard testimony
regarding the current requirement in public school science
curriculum to teach both strengths and weaknesses of various
scientific theories.
Does it
seem strange that there should even be a question?
Purely from an educator's standpoint the answer should be
black and white. Of course, students should be given the
opportunity to hear evidence on both sides of the issue.
Don't we desperately crave for students to develop critical
thinking skills such as comparing, contrasting, analyzing, and
evaluating? Aren't they especially needful in the field of
science? Isn't that how science progresses?
Tragically the history of science paints a different picture.
The field we would like to consider so objective isn't
necessarily so. In fact, according to Thomas Kuhn's
The
Structure of Scientific Revolutions, (a book cited as
"a landmark in intellectual history" by
Science Digest), what
is likely to be seen in Austin is a repeat of how scientists
throughout the ages have dealt with their beliefs.
The side
in power will vehemently resist consideration of opposing
views.
In studying how scientific revolutions have taken place over
the centuries, Kuhn found that in different scientific fields
the process of change would follow a similar pattern. Looking
at a particular issue some scientist or scientists would
develop a paradigm or model related to that field. Once
accepted, it would be taught in the academic field and
students would be expected to accept it not through rigorous
examination of competing models but simply because it was the
accepted model.
Consider these steps that Kuhn outlines:
- Scientists find or develop a paradigm or model which
upon acceptance becomes "normal" science.
- Scientists, rather than trying to find novelties, are
fixed in their preconceptions regarding the background
theory.
- Because scientists are entrenched regarding the
background theory they have difficulty seeing outside the
box of what they consider to be normal science.
- Scientists within the accepted camp band together; they
vehemently resist other scientists who find anomalies to
their theories, who deviate from "normal" science.
- It takes a crisis for the powers that be to begin
considering or accepting anomalies.
- Following the crisis that forces the "insiders" to
consider anomalies, at some point a scientific revolution
takes place, and that which was resisted so rigorously
becomes accepted as a new "normal" science.
And consider the student who is simply trying to learn what
is true science? Does he receive the benefit of evaluating
competing models? Tragically, no. Kuhn writes, "...science
students accept theories on the authority of teacher and text,
not because of evidence."
It seems to me that in Texas we need to give our students
every opportunity possible to consider the competing models.
Help them to examine evidence and develop critical thinking
skills. Give them an opportunity to debate their viewpoints
in the classroom. The study of strengths and weaknesses of
various biological theories might actually become the most
academically invigorating in the curriculum!
Students will benefit, teachers could benefit and science
itself could benefit through the students who go through this
process and proceed to become leaders later on in the
scientific community.
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