The Time I Let Religion = Ignorance
Ann Althouse published this interesting and poignant post about the teaching of creationism in public schools and an experience she had growing up. I wonder how common her experience was.
I was born and raised in Utah. I am LDS and experienced the upbringing that is typical of someone raised in a society where their religion is shared by 90% of everyone around them. I loved it and am grateful for the family, life, and experiences I had growing up. I only recently began to appreciate the fact that such an upbringing is profoundly atypical. It is an excellent way to grow up…but there are negatives.
I remember being in 9th grade when I had my first encounter with a science teacher who was trying to teach evolution to a class full of Mormons. E.J. (the instructor) gave us the standard disclaimer about what he was going to be teaching us. He said we didn’t need to necessarily believe in evolution but that he was required to teach it and we would be tested on it. He finished his brief qualifying remarks with something close to the words, “…I think it is important to note that there is a lot of evidence obtained through use of the scientific method that supports the truth of evolutionary theory.”
At that time I was very ignorant of what evolution was. I’d heard of it a couple times but only in Sunday school classes where teachers spoke of it derisively. I don’t even remember talking about it with my parents although I’m sure I did. My basic understanding was that it was a bunch of atheistic hooey. I figured I’d keep an open mind the first time I approached the subject from an academic perspective…I’d give E.J. a chance to convince me.
Before our teacher could proceed with the instruction he had planned one hand went up.
I didn’t know Tina (name has been changed) very well at the time. She was somewhat attractive but taller than me so I didn’t really have much interest in her. She was always kissing up to all the teachers in a way I thought was unbecoming and I considered her somewhat snobby, but that probably wasn’t fair as I didn’t really know her. I did know that she was very smart, could play the piano, and got good grades. She was one of the people who was in the running for valedictorian our senior year. I remember her crying once when she got an A-. I remember smiling. (Yeah…I was a bit of a jerk…but I’m guessing most readers here already know that!!!)
When E.J. called on Tina we were all surprised at the tone in her voice when she responded. I’d never heard her speak angrily at a teacher before but that is how she spoke.
“Mr. J., Why do we have to learn about evolution. It isn’t true and it is something we are never going to use in our lives or even benefit from knowing. It is totally wrong for you to try to teach something that goes against my religious beliefs. I’m not going to participate in any of the material you teach about evolution and I don’t care if my grade suffers for it.”
The room was silent. Everyone was now paying attention. My Initial reaction was one of surprise that Tina was speaking so disrespectfully to E.J. (I was the one who was normally giving him a hard time…) and then my mind was filled with a mix of a.) guilt that I hadn’t been the courageous Mormon speaking out against the intellectual trying to teach us the false doctrines of men and b.) the desire to support Tina in her revolution against this authority figure who was going to try to teach us these pernicious evil ideas.
Nearly everyone else in the class had the same series of thoughts that I did and immediately any chance E.J. had of effectively teaching us what science had learned about how life on earth has changed and evolved over millions of years was gone. I remember the rest of class time that day was filled with intense arguments about how evolution was bunk and how it shouldn’t be forced on students any more than any other religious topic should. At the time I thought Tina was a hero. Now I look back and curse her and myself for being so naďve. Years would go by before I would open my mind back up and accept that I don’t have to automatically reject any scientific learning that appears to contradict my religious beliefs. I don’t know how life was created or how it evolved on earth. I don’t know if people evolved from monkeys. I don’t dispute the scriptural account of creation but I do argue that it seems to leave out more than a few of the details about how things got to be the way they are.
I don’t think there is any place for the teaching of creationism in public schools. Parents and churches teach religion better than any school ever could. My kids will be raised LDS and will be taught that Jesus created everything because I believe that is true and I want them to know my love for the gospel. They will also be taught to keep an open mind about how he might have done it. They will have a firm grounding in the scientific method and how it works. They will also know what science has learned about how life and our universe developed. It is important that they know this so they don’t feel cheated when they get older and find out that it isn’t possible that the creation and evolution of life on earth is as simple as their Sunday School teacher said it was. If we ever live in Utah and my kids go to school there I hope it is my kid who throws the rhetorical smack down on whoever tries to be the martyr/hero in class when the discussion of evolution, the big bang, or any other controversial scientific topic comes up. Maybe someday she will be remembered by her classmates who are grateful that they didn’t allow their minds to be shuttered to interesting and vital understanding because she courageously encouraged them to keep their minds open.
OK…I know that is a bit melodramatic but I do have high hopes for my girls!!! I hope they can be stronger and smarter than I was.
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I don’t think that (if we knew everything there is to know) science and religion contradict each other at all. The problem is that we don’t know everything there is to know. I believe in evolution. You would have to have your eyes shut pretty tight to say that nothing on this earth evolves and that it was all created exactly as it is now. Evolution is pretty obvious in our world. Now, I’m not say that humans evolved from apes, but I am saying that life evolves - survival of the fittest, etc. I, like you, hope to teach my children to have an open mind and remember that the scientists don’t know everything, but neither do the preachers.
Comment by Lydia Tarbox — November 20, 2004 @ 2:48 pm
Thanks for you comment Lydia. I thought it was pretty common for Mormons to think on this topic the way we do but I’ve been finding out recently that this is not necessarily the case. I have to admit that I am a bit surprised at that. Oh well.
Comment by Jeremy — November 21, 2004 @ 7:41 pm
Funny you keep mentioning that this theory is more religious in nature yet you stated it was “scientific learning”. Theory isn’t science. Science can be tested and retested producing the same results.
Theory is more like Philosophy and that is where it should stay. I agree there is not any place for the teaching of creationism in public schools. Unless it is in a Philosophy or Theology class.
Comment by Michael — November 23, 2004 @ 11:54 am
How do you teach your children that “Jesus created everything” while encouraging them to consider the overwhelming evidence that life on Earth has evolved from a common ancestor? Do you mean that Jesus created everything by sparking the big bang? Perhaps he had humans in mind as an endpoint of billions of years of evolution. You sure won’t find that in the scriptures. It gets a little complicated to reconcile the traditional religious explanation of creation with the scientific one.
Comment by john — December 3, 2004 @ 9:22 pm
What an interesting post!
Shouldn’t we teach all aspects of belief and theory to our children, so that they will be wise and open enough to learn more than we knew?
I tend to wonder at the late arguments on this case. I wonder if we shouldn’t teach all aspects of these theories together. To fail to teach creationism along with evolution is to fail to teach pure science. According to pure science, no theory can be discredited until it is proven false. Neither evolution nor creationism has been proven such. To ban schools from teaching either is as bad as the other.
I loved taking astronomy in college for this very reason. As astronomy literally explodes in breadth as a science, chapters are rewritten every year as we find out that the majority of things we thought to be true are now disproven. I remember my professor saying many times, “Well, back to the drawing board I guess.”
Stars don’t explode, they unravel, and yes it is possible to overstuff a black hole, …and on and on.
Let’s not close our eyes to any theory until it is proven false beyond question.
Comment by cody — December 16, 2004 @ 3:17 pm
Cody writes “According to pure science, no theory can be discredited until it is proven false”. In order to be proven false a theory must, of course, be falsifiable. This is a central characteristic of scientific theories. Creationism is not falsifiable. What experiment could you ever perform to prove it false? For this reason creationism is not a scientific theory. Cody’s statement “To fail to teach creationism along with evolution is to fail to teach pure science” is therefore completely incorrect.
There are many different beliefs about religious creation. These could be taught in a comparative religion class but do not belong in the science curriculum.
Comment by john — December 16, 2004 @ 10:18 pm
Wow…this may be the first time ever that I can’t find any fault with a single word of one John’s comments. I think he’s absolutely right. In no sense that I can think of is creationism a scientific theory. It is faith.
Not that there is anything wrong with that…
Devine creation should be taught at home, at church, or, in seminary (if your an LDS high school student). It doesn’t belong in public schools.
As to John’s earlier comment I have to admit that I agree with much of that one too. He’s right on the facts but I disagree with his conclusion. I agree that overwhelming evidence points to a common ancestor for all life. The DNA that exists in all life is far too similar to have developed independently over millions of years for every single living entity. Over 60% of human genes can also be found in the common fruit fly. It is inconceivable that these complex DNA patterns developed through random selection thousands of times…once for each species.
That said, I also think it is inconceivable that everything came together the way it is by chance. I don’t know how it was done but I think there really must be intelligence behind the creation of life. As this isn’t really something I can scientifically prove or even provide any solid evidence for other than my own personal spiritual experiences it is pointless for me to try to argue about it with John or anyone else…just like it is pointless for an educator to try to have a discussion about it in public school.
Hey Cody…were you in my class when the story from this post happened? It was a long time ago and I can’t remember if we were both in EJ’s class at the same time. I bet he remembers it!
Comment by Jeremy — December 17, 2004 @ 2:51 pm
How are you able to reconcile your LDS beliefs about creation with the idea that there is a common ancestor to all life? You believe that there must be some intelligence behind the creation of life. You must believe that this intelligent being first created the common ancestor of all life, probably a simple single celled organism, about 3 billion years ago. Did the intelligent designer then guide evolution towards the emergence of man? Why go through the billions of years of protazoa, trilobites, dinosaurs, etc? Doesn’t this contradict LDS doctrine? It seems that you have developed your own theology. Wouldn’t you agree that your religious beliefs are distinct from traditional LDS doctrine?
Comment by john — December 17, 2004 @ 10:04 pm
I guess my answer is that I don’t know. I’m not alone in that. As Cody mentioned there is much about the creation of our world and the life on it that science doesn’t provide the first clue about. We know that all life is related and we make theories about how that can make sense but the sparseness of the fossil record and the lack of much other evidence makes it impossible to know which theory is correct.
Mormonism (and much of the rest of Christianity) has nothing but very vague doctrine on the creation. We believe that everything was created by God as part of his plan for the Human family. I don’t consider the bible’s story of the creation to be a text containing all of the information man has been allowed by God to know about the creation. I don’t think I’m leaving the bounds of what my church teaches in saying that the scriptural record is sparse because the details about exactly how God made our earth aren’t that important from a spiritual point of view. As long as we recognize that he did it for us…so we could experience mortal life as part of an eternal existence…the details about how he did it aren’t that big a deal. This is all just interesting pure science for us to work out on our own.
The idea that God would use the same tools (DNA and other proteins) to create all life doesn’t really bother me as far as my faith is concerned. I don’t think I’m really descended from a single celled organism…but I couldn’t make a great scientifically sound argument for a different theory on how we came to be either. I just don’t know. I guess Occam’s Razor suggests I’m probably on the wrong side of that argument…but the limited information man has about our evolution doesn’t do a lot to convince me that I’m that crazy in diverging a bit from current science on this topic. My personal religious beliefs wouldn’t be shaken if I were proven to be incorrect. If God chose to create man by evolving life from a single celled organism through billions of mutations and many cataclysmic extinctions…than that’s the way he did it…no matter how distasteful I think it is.
In the end it doesn’t really matter that we disagree on this. If I die and my conciousness ceases to exist than I guess you were right and I was wrong. Congratulations. If not…well then…cool for both of us! I don’t have a pure knowledge of which it’s going to be but I know what I would rather believe.
Comment by Jeremy — December 18, 2004 @ 6:43 am
A couple of comments about that last post. You write “We know that all life is related and we make theories about how that can make sense but the sparseness of the fossil record and the lack of much other evidence makes it impossible to know which theory is correct.” First, it is not entirely clear what competing theories you are referring to but I’ll assume you mean intelligent design and evolution. Intelligent design is not a scientific theory so it makes no predictions that can be tested by gathering empirical evidence. The fossil record and the “other evidence” you are referring to support the theory of evolution and say nothing about intelligent design. Second, you are wrong when you say there is a lack of much other evidence. You are apparently uninformed regarding the evidence but that doesn’t mean it isn’t there. For an excellent discussion of the evidence for common descent check out http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/comdesc/ and start with the section on phylogenetics. Or just pick up a biology textbook.
I suggested that your beliefs are distinctly different from LDS doctrine. In your response you said “I don’t think I’m leaving the bounds of what my church teaches in saying that the scriptural record is sparse because the details about exactly how God made our earth aren’t that important from a spiritual point of view.” I suggested that your view diverged regarding evolution, not the sparse details about how God made our earth. Its one thing to suggest that the scriptural record is sparse but entirely another to suggest that we evolved from a common ancestor. So I do think that your beliefs are outside the bounds of your church doctrine. Not that there is anything wrong with that. But the implication is that you believe that the LDS doctrine is a little off in this regard. By the way, the story of how God made the earth is not completely devoid of detail. The details that are provided do seem at odds with the theory of evolution.
You clearly contradict yourself in your last two posts. In your recent post you write “I don’t think I’m really descended from a single celled organism…but I couldn’t make a great scientifically sound argument for a different theory on how we came to be either.” Previously you said “I agree that overwhelming evidence points to a common ancestor for all life.” Care to clarify?
You say in your last post “As long as we recognize that he did it for us…so we could experience mortal life as part of an eternal existence…the details about how he did it aren’t that big a deal.” Every culture has had a version of a creation story; a set of myths to answer fundamental questions of meaning and address our place in the universe. These myths are creative, diverse, and soul satisfying to those who believe them but they aren’t ever based on empirical, objective evidence. Don’t you think that the ideas you just laid out fit better in that category than in the realm of actual literal truth?
Comment by john — December 18, 2004 @ 3:07 pm
Could I query then, why the scientific process itself should not be regarded as a sort of religion?
Comment by Cody — December 20, 2004 @ 12:25 pm
It’s an interesting question Cody. I do think that there is a sense in which the scientific world view can be regarded as a sort of religion. Many people attribute profound importance to scientific theories and find meaning through them. One definition of the word religion is “A cause, principle, or activity pursued with zeal or conscientious devotion”. I think that science can be such a cause.
The more traditional definition of religion includes reference to the supernatural or spiritual. If religion is viewed in this way then science is not a sort of religion. By definition science deals only with natural phenomena. Additionally, Scientific theories demand objective, empirical, reproducible evidence for verification. Religion allows subjective experience to be weighed as evidence. It is not testable. It is dogmatic rather than self-correcting.
How do you decide which of the many religious beliefs are correct? It becomes one group’s word against the other. There is no way to test between them. By demanding that a theory make testable predictions, science provides a way that all observers can agree on which theory is correct.
Comment by john — December 20, 2004 @ 6:54 pm