Two states already allow creationism and the theory of evolution to be taught side-by-side 6 , and more such legislation is being aggressively pushed forth 7. As of yet, none of these proposed bills have passed, but the margins by which such legislation is failing are narrower than they have been in years. The U. Supreme Court, as well as a number of state courts, have weighed in on the issue of teaching creation science in public schools 9.
In Lemon v. Third, the statute must not result in an excessive entanglement of government with religion. Neither was required to be taught, but per the statute, if one was taught, the other was also required to be taught.
The Supreme Court of the United States granted certiorari, and agreed with the petitioners. The appellant-respondents could not identify a clear secular purpose for the Creationism Act. Moreover, the Act fail[ed] even to ensure that creation science [would] be taught, but instead require[ed] the teaching of this theory only when the theory of evolution [was] taught.
Per the U. In addition to the Supreme Court, a number of state courts have also weighed in on the issue, and have likewise found that the regulations are incapable of passing the Lemon Test and are therefore unconstitutional Despite this, anti-evolution legislation continues to be introduced by state legislatures even to this day.
District Court for the Eastern District of Arkansas was among the first to engage in a comprehensive analysis of whether creation science was, in fact, a science, in McLean v. Arkansas Board of Education Initially, the McLean Court noted that creation from nothing necessarily depends on supernatural intervention, and therefore cannot be guided by natural law, cannot be tested, and cannot be falsified, all of which are inherent tenets of science.
In methodology, creationists do not utilize data in order to reach conclusions about the world; instead, they take the Book of Genesis at face value and then work tirelessly to mold scientific findings in order to support it. This is antithetical to the scientific method, which requires that a scientific theory be always tentative, revisable, or abandonable in the face of inconsistent facts and data.
Finally, creationist works have not been published, subjected to peer review, or accepted by any major scientific organization in the county. In weighing all of these factors, the McLean Court found that creation science was not science in definition, in methodology, or in its view of the natural world.
In Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District, the U. District Court for the Middle District of Pennsylvania engaged in perhaps an even more comprehensive analysis, expanding on many of the issues addressed in McLean The Court also considered that all major scientific associations in the country have taken the position that intelligent design is not, and cannot be, a science It was formed in the s in the midst of a massive upswing in Fundamentalist religious fervor across the United States, and was the direct result of Christian backlash against the Darwinian theory of evolution This sudden religious surge was accompanied by a great deal of legislation preventing the teaching of evolution in schools, almost always requiring that creationism be taught instead.
By definition, creationism involves the belief that God created the universe and all of the creatures in it While it is true that many religions have their own beliefs regarding the creation of humanity, almost all creationist legislation in the United States is based in the Fundamentalist Christian view of that creation.
This is evidenced not only by the historical roots of the movement but also by the inclusion of references to the worldwide flood in a number of creationist bills, which is an event unique to the Book of Genesis Even if a statute does not include such a blatantly Christian view, one must necessarily believe in a God in order to believe in divine creation.
It is constitutionally impermissible for a public school to promote a Christian religious worldview over any others; therefore, regulations requiring the teaching of creationism without also introducing other views of creation violate the First Amendment as a government endorsement of a particular religion. The beliefs and affiliations of the President tend to affect legislative action. Where the President endorses a particular belief, then legislators of the same party tend to do all they can to push through laws that coincide with that belief.
For example, when President George W. While some individual scientists have professed a belief in intelligent design 37 , no major scientific organization has backed it Because intelligent design is firmly grounded not in science, but in religion, this amounts to legislature presenting a religious belief as a scientific fact, which cannot be tolerated under the First Amendment. Perhaps even more troubling than the possible influence on legislatures is the tendency of individual teachers to seize on public sentiment in order to insert their personal beliefs into their curriculum, with or without legislative approval.
By openly questioning evolution, the President can send the message that it is perfectly acceptable for teachers to do the same. According to Patricia Princehouse, the director of the evolutionary biology program at Case Western Reserve University, evolution is not taught much in schools.
The tendency of such a large percentage of the population to reject accepted biological science is particularly troubling where so many challenges currently facing the world are scientific. Arkansas ruling, which prohibited anti-evolution statutes in their entirety What we are seeing today appears to be following a similar pattern—the world is rapidly advancing in its understanding of science, and the United States must incorporate these concepts into its curriculum in order to keep pace.
Unfortunately, constant political repudiation of accepted scientific theories has complicated this issue by crippling scientific education in many areas of the United States Students may be entering a world in which they are fully unprepared to address the mounting dangers of climate change and energy crises, for example.
Failing to instruct students in the fundamentals of science therefore jeopardizes not only the futures of those students in a global economy that will likely be largely science-based; it also jeopardizes the future of the nation as a whole by ensuring that an entire generation is misinformed about the valuable role that science plays in our society.
Often, even when evolution is taught as a part of the biology curriculum, teachers do not have enough knowledge about the subject itself to resolve this confusion on the part of the student, or do not feel that it is their role to do so This gap in scientific understanding is likely to only become larger if the Trump administration is successful in enacting its intended educational policies.
The most commonly used and widely accepted criterion for determining whether or not a theory is scientific in nature is whether or not it is falsifiable, an idea put forth by the philosopher Karl Popper.
That is to say, one can conceive of a test or experiment which could prove the idea to be false. By this standard it is clear that the theory of evolution is scientific in nature. It has been put through rigorous tests and the evidence in favor of it is demonstrable. However, the same cannot be said for creation science.
The act of creation, as defined in creation science is not falsifiable because no testable bounds or experiments can be imposed on the creator. The creator is defined as limitless, with the power to create infinite universes out of nothing, each with its own unique character. It is thus impossible to disprove a claim, that by its very definition, accounts for every conceivable contingency.
In addition, teaching creationism as a science would also open the door to teaching other belief systems that have proven to be unscientific in nature. For example, astrology would be taught alongside astronomy, pyramid power would be given equal time with modern physics, and the flat earth theory would be mentioned alongside the space program. While creationism should not be taught as a science, that does not mean that it should not be taught at all.
Philosopher Daniel Dennett proposes requiring all children to take a world religions class at a young age, in which they are taught the facts of all major world religions. He states that they should be taught the facts about their histories, creeds, texts, music, symbolism, prohibitions, requirements, etc. And, as long as children are informed of other religions, they can be taught whatever creed their parents and mentors believe they should learn.
There is a movement to promote critical thinking skills Lilienfeld, , for psychologists to work toward debiasing public thought Lilienfeld et al. While it is important to train our students by discussing controversies within our fields and between competing scientific theories Scott and Branch, ; Dawkins and Coyne, , it is also useful to train our students in detecting pseudoscience and to argue against it Lilienfeld, Among the various psychology courses that I have taught over the years, one of my favorites is a course on evolution and human behavior.
Coming from an experimental background, trained in animal learning and behavior, I understand human behavior as an interaction between our evolved tendencies and our environments. There has been controversy about this field from the time that E. Within this course, I also have the opportunity to discuss cognitive biases as evolved heuristics e.
In this context, where I model scientific logic and provide information about human errors in cognition, a discussion of creationism seems perfectly appropriate. Creationism is presented as a sociopolitical controversy rather than a scientific controversy.
I then present several common assertions from creationism e. At the same time, I explain several of the common logical fallacies that are evident in creationist arguments.
I encourage students to ask questions, and force me to defend my statements. I then ask them to attempt to generate hypotheses and tests of creationism. Their struggles with this task lead them, logically, to the conclusion that many creationist assertions are unfalsifiable and therefore non-scientific. Although it feels ironic, the following anecdotal evidence illustrates my approach. I presented an ad hoc reasoning fallacy, in which some creationists have responded to fossil evidence with statements that those fossils must have been put there by supernatural forces to trick or test the faith of believers.
After I pointed out that original statements are revised in order to preserve the key belief creationism , a student indicated that he was confused. I could see several other students tilt their heads to ponder this point, and realized that I needed to back up and revisit the concept of falsifiability: using evidence to reject a hypothesis is scientific, whereas creating an explanation for evidence in order to defend the original hypothesis is not scientific.
Scientists use ad hoc reasoning to refine and strengthen theory but not to insulate a weak theory from valid criticism. We then discussed several situations, including decisions about medical treatments or support for political parties, in which people should reject their hypotheses based on available evidence, but instead create additional explanatory layers in order to avoid changing their minds.
Students have expressed appreciation for being given the tools to better argue their positions. There are several reasons why this approach is valuable. It also debunks pseudoscientific beliefs Lilienfeld, , by providing direct evidence against them. Further, by practicing arguments against standard creationist assertions, students benefit from the inoculation effect see Jost and Hardin, and should therefore be better able to refute similar arguments in the future.
I think that all science educators could benefit from strategies associated with teaching critical thinking. Teaching content alone does not teach students to think like scientists.
Development of critical thinking requires that students learn content along with an opportunity to practice the metacognitive strategies associated with critical thinking Willingham, I argue that alchemy could belong in chemistry classrooms, if it demonstrated why some methods of gathering knowledge are more valid than others.
Again, my psychology training may bias my views. Perhaps as a consequence of an inferiority complex, academic psychology has focused on training students in research methods to a much greater extent than other sciences Winston and Blais, The table of contents for most psychology textbooks will reveal a chapter on methodology, and the history of the discipline.
There are many famous examples in psychology of rejected hypotheses and paradigm shifts. It was soundly rejected because of evidence presented by physiologists and others. This rejection provides important lessons about differences between scientific approaches to psychology and non-scientific approaches. Our understanding of psychology is based not only on verifiable facts, but also on rejection of previous ideas. Just as phrenology belongs in the psychology classroom, so might creationism.
The argument for teaching the controversy implies that science is a matter of opinion debated by opposing parties with equally valid positions. When creationists describe intelligent design as a theory equal to that of evolutionary theory, they demonstrate their ignorance of the language of science even as they use its words Barnes, By using jargon inappropriately, they deceive people who assume that everyone uses those words consistently.
When I talk about the theory of evolution, I refer to an overarching set of principles and predictions that allows me to understand the natural world. A scientific theory is not a tentative statement, but rather is supported by empirical evidence. When I talk about hypotheses I refer to predictions, based on theory, that require testing.
The hypothesis is tentative, and may be refuted by evidence, but the failure of a hypothesis does not necessarily degrade a theory. Positioning intelligent design as scientific theory is inappropriate, because it lacks empirical support and portions of it are untestable. Learning to discriminate between appropriate and inappropriate uses of those words requires more than simply memorizing definitions.
If students apply that knowledge and practice the skills associated with science, they will generate a deeper understanding. If I simply state that creationism is not scientific, then I ask my students to take my word for it because I am the authority as a scientist.
When I allow them to apply the scientific method to creationism, they practice being scientists themselves. Although critical thinking is very difficult to teach, and often does not transfer across domains Halpern, , there is incremental value in providing multiple opportunities to practice critical thinking while learning new scientific content Willingham, My position is not restricted to the use of creationism to teach critical thinking. The same position could apply to other anti-science views including those opposed to vaccines or other validated medical procedures, to climate change denialism, or to other supernatural explanations for natural phenomena.
As educators, we can take the opportunity to tackle topics that students may see in the media, on social media, or around the dinner table, and model our thought processes as we explain how scientists come to conclusions. We can also allow students to practice their logic skills, and apply them to new topics that arise with each poorly informed Facebook meme, or celebrity fad.
Non-science and anti-science views do have a place in the science classroom, because they can be used to train students in the logic associated with scientific thought. The author declares that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest. National Center for Biotechnology Information , U. Journal List Front Psychol v.
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