Once Again: The Myth of Biological Purity

The Cincinnati Enquirer today gives a platform to local geneticist Thomas Bartman once again to insist that public school biology classes forbid the teaching of creationism or intelligent design alongside evolution. We tire of this refrain, even more than we tire of "Bush lied." But as a reminder to our gentle readers, we offer these brief, mild words of rebuttal.

First, Dr. Bartman, "intelligent design" is not a "pseudonym" for "creationism," though we thank you for finding a new and cleverer way of equating the two. If the two were the same, we would not have advocates of each criticizing the other almost as much as they criticize Darwinism. We thank gentle reader Danny Joe for this trenchant observation in a conversation awhile back. [Yes, gentle readers! Some of us yet have face-to-face conversations!]

But to the larger and more important point, really also the more obvious point. The fact of public school education is this: no classroom sticks strictly to its discipline, and no classroom should.

In English classes, students discuss race relations, family dynamics, the causes of crime, appropriate punishments for crimes, politics and history, all while reading novels. In history classes they discuss current issues (see list above), all while learning about event of the past to which the present can be compared. In art classes, students will from time to time be led in a discussion of the boundaries of free speech and artistic expression, by an art teacher, no less. In math, from kindergarten forward students do story problems that apply their mathematical skills to issues that aren't math, like business, home economics, architecture, engineering or science. In science classes, public policy issues related to scientific research or the environment come up about as often as the periodic table or the functions of major organ systems. And then there are engineering applications, often used to entice students into consideration of the natural sciences.

Are such discussions off topic? Are they a waste of students' time? Not at all! Classrooms are interdisciplinary because good learning is interdisciplinary. Bartman fools himself if he thinks that people are only interested in science because people like Bartman can study zebrafish and maybe discover something that will help humans medically (and properly speaking, he's going outside his discipline, from biology to medicine, with that move). They're also interested in what science might tell them about life, the universe and everything. Even teenagers care about such questions now and then.

Properly speaking, the assertion that the universe was designed by a creator is not a scientific statement. It is an answer to the question that one asks after the science is done. It is a philosophical statement. It arises thus: given the complexity of life and the close tolerances necessary for a universe to exist that could sustain it, is it more reasonable to assume that the present situation arose by chance or by design? That's a question that can and should be discussed by public school students.

Bartman objects that a biologist knows nothing of such things and shouldn't teach them. Well, SWNID agrees that Bartman apparently knows nothing of such things. Had he paid closer attention in that philosophy course that he took as an undergraduate, he might have more respect for ways of knowing that are other than scientific. We'll add that Bartman is also not an educator or a public policy specialist. But he has offered opinions on these subjects. What to do?

Well, let's remember first that high school biology teachers aren't biologists either. They're high school teachers who know enough biology to teach teenagers the fundamentals, or at least pretend to. If the state educational bureaucracy can teach them that much biology along with the 50 credit hours of education courses they require, they can probably work in enough philosophy to enable teachers to lead a reasonable discussion with adolescents on the question of origins.

But, Bartman might reply, that would mean the teaching of religion in the public school classroom, breaking our most sacred taboo. But SWNID rejoins that when we discuss civil rights or just punishments or family dynamics or ecological policy in history or English or biology, we are also discussing matters that for people of faith are informed by faith. It's all religion for the religious. SWNID confesses that he can hardly take a breath without considering it from a Christian point of view. We remain obsessed with that Jewish guy who died on a cross.

At the same time, there's nothing religious in the particularistic sense about intelligent design theory. Muslims, Jews, Roman Catholics, Eastern Orthodox, and Protestants of all denominations and no denomination can join with theosophists and deists and philosophical theists in affirming the probability of an intelligent designer. Buddhists probably can too; as I make it out, they can do just about anything. The only ones who can't, it seems, are the biologists.

But by the way, Dr. Bartman, SWNID knows PhD biologists in our very city who affirm intelligent design. They don't talk about it much because people like you can't deal with the question thoughtfully, let alone politely. But be careful! They're all around you!

And the question comes up whether you want it to or not. A recent PBS Nova program on origins included the observation that evidence of the big bang suggests that life did not arise "by accident." Even allowing for the grand and metaphorical rhetoric of a popular TV program, does not such an admission provoke the question as to whether something can be an accident or not an accident apart from the intention of a person? Is this not the state of the question right now?

Oh, forgive me, Dr. Bartman! That question presumed some quantum physics. You are a biologist. You can't consider such matters. Back to your zebrafish!

Better still, just give it up, dear Dr. Bartman. The way that a scientist knows science is not the only way that humankind can know truth. Your discipline raises questions that it cannot answer. We'd like to discuss those questions. Right now, before we leave the lab. You can't stop us.

Note to gentle readers: this is a rant, knocked out late at night with little consideration. SWNID is mulling the making of an offer to the Enquirer to contribute a "Your Voice" column on this subject, ignoring our principled consternation that our local paper uses this feature as a means of running its opinion page nearly for free. Your comments on the value of such an endeavor will be appreciated and will play a role in our decision to write something suitably concise and coherent, unlike this blather.