To the Editor:
Addressing the conflict between science and faith (“Teaching Science, With Faith in Mind,” The Chronicle, May 1) requires recognizing that there are two separate cultures, each valid, each important, each its own domain with its own rules, addressing different problems. Science and faith must understand and respect each other while avoiding inappropriate intrusion on one another. We need a “separate but equal” approach in which each culture can be taught by its own rules and with due respect for the other.
Science aggressively intrudes on faith as much as faith on science. We call the inappropriate intrusions of faith on science “scientific creationism” or “intelligent” design,” but much of behavioral genetics intrudes inappropriately and very aggressively on areas of emotion, faith, moral values, and cultural or social explanation. Scientists often take the attitude that no other reasoning is permissible; that “we” are smart and educated and “they” are ignorant and stupid. No wonder there is a backlash.
Explicitly recognizing the validity of faith before evolution is addressed can help students recognize the separate importance of science and the rules by which it operates. I begin my Human Evolution class by exploring, and allowing students to discuss, the two cultures. Then I point out that Human Evolution is a science course that works within the cultural rules of science. Students need not believe the explanations, but they need to know the kinds of evidence and reasoning that science uses, in order to function in the modern world.
Clarification helps. There are in fact only two cultural rules of science. The first rule is that explanations of natural phenomena are presented to a competitive market, and subject to its judgments, the competition hopefully eliminating poor explanations and honing good ones. The competition never ends. Science is process, not fact. What is taught as science is simply the state of the competition at the moment. Darwinian evolution has been honed many times, but never discarded in 150 years. That is evidence of its explanatory power. But it can still be challenged, and I encourage my students to do so. (There have been exciting and enlightening results emanating from undergraduates.)
The second rule is that scientific explanations must be based on uniformitarian rules, i.e., explanations must use known or knowable natural principles and by definition in this culture cannot include magic or miracles. Uniformitarianism is where fear really lies, I think, because it implies no guarantees. I point out how uniformitarian reasoning is the basis for students’ own thought and for solutions to modern problems.
Mark N. Cohen
Professor of Anthropology
State University of New York at Plattsburgh
Plattsburgh
