APS News Readers Respond to "Creationism Versus Physical Science"

From: Moorad Alexanian (alexanian@uncwil.edu)
Date: Sun Dec 24 2000 - 13:45:17 EST

  • Next message: Dale K. Stalnaker: "Re: APS News Readers Respond to "Creationism Versus Physical Science""

    January 2001 Edition

    LETTERS

    APS News Readers Respond to "Creationism Versus Physical Science"

    Copyright2000 Paul Dlugokencky (aDailyCartoon.com) for APS News (first
    printed - November 2000 issue)

    I couldn't agree more with Stephen G. Brush's article "Creationism Versus
    Physical Science" (APS News, November 2000). As Brush points out,
    creationism affects not only biology but all the sciences. In fact, the
    infamous Kansas State Board of Education decision strips from that state's
    education standards not only all mention of biological evolution but also
    all mention of the big bang, radioactive dating, continental drift, and the
    age of Earth. The best response is education: teachers should include this
    issue in every introductory science course. Based on 30 years' experience in
    doing just that, I would like to recommend several pertinent topics for
    physics teachers.
    First and foremost, teach critical thinking, including the fallacies of
    pseudoscience. As an irrational belief that is made to look scientific but
    that is not supported by scientific methods, "creation science" is a perfect
    example of pseudoscience. Second, teach radioactive dating as an application
    of nuclear physics, and present the main geological ages along with
    supporting radioactive and non-radioactive evidence. Third, discuss the
    creationists' anti-evolution argument based on the second law of
    thermodynamics, and the scientific reply (see Brush's article). Fourth,
    present big bang cosmology and the supporting evidence: the expanding
    universe, the three-degree background radiation, "ripples" in the background
    radiation, and quantitative agreement between big-bang isotope-formation
    predictions and observed isotope ratios in our galaxy's oldest stars. Fifth,
    discuss the search for and possibility of extraterrestrial life, including
    the hypothesis of the chemical origin of life on Earth and supporting
    experimental evidence. Always stress the theme of "how do we know," i.e.
    present lots of evidence.

    I include these topics in my liberal-arts college physics course for
    non-scientists and can testify that, while many students disagree with some
    specific conclusions, nearly all students find these topics instructive,
    interesting, and even fascinating.
    Art Hobson
    Professor Emeritus of Physics, University of Arkansas

    ******

    Recently, I have found this conflict very difficult to understand. Physical
    Science and Creationists (indeed, religious persons of virtually every
    creed) agree: The Universe had a beginning. You would think that this
    fundamental agreement would be infinitely more significant than the
    relatively minor detail of just how long ago that was. It would appear,
    however, that Creationists are not really "Fundamentalists", as they style
    themselves, but rather, "Literalists", which makes all the difference.

    Another example: Brush reports, "If you teach children they are descended
    from animals, the reasoning goes, they will assume they can behave like
    animals." But as he correctly points out earlier, this is the fallacy of
    assuming entropy increase only. What, one may ask, would the reasoning be if
    you teach the children that they are "ascended" from animals?
    T. Goldman
    Los Alamos, New Mexico

    ******

    In his helpful discussion, Stephen G. Brush mentions the guilt by
    association between evolution and secular humanism introduced by
    televangelists. The televangelists I have viewed are merely objecting to the
    claim that evolution is an unsupervised, impersonal process (1996 Statement
    on Teaching Evolution of the National Association of Biology Teachers). Such
    a claim is a logical fallacy identified by Aristotle (350 BC). For, on the
    basis of evidence from the material world, evolutionists are claiming that
    there is no personal supervisor of evolution outside the material world. It
    is as though Hamlet claimed that there was no Shakespeare because he could
    not find Shakespeare within the confines of the play.

    Finally however, in 1997, 138 years after Darwin's Origin of Species, the
    NABT deleted the two words: unsupervised and impersonal from their
    definition of evolution. This removal of the challenge to the supernatural
    should remove much of the opposition to evolution by thoughtful people.
    John A. McIntyre
    Texas A&M University

    ******

    The notion of a Creator who brought space time and all into being is central
    to the book of Genesis and no scholarly exegesis can expunge that from it.
    Those who believe in a Creator are not all "Young Earth Creationists" as
    Stephen Brush implies and attacks.

    Darwin meant by evolution the process whereby life arose from non-living
    matter and subsequently developed entirely by natural means. This is a form
    of scientific materialism that Freeman Dyson decries in "Science and
    Religion Can Work Together." (APS News, November 2000.) Richard Dawkins,
    famed author of "The Blind Watchmaker," has said that Darwin made it
    possible to be an "intellectually fulfilled atheist."

    Scientists and teachers ought to make it clear, as Brush indicates, that
    evolution and cosmology are working assumptions, not established facts.
    Unlike physics, evolution and cosmology are sciences in the sense of
    forensic science. The evidence for evolutionary transition of humans from
    apelike ancestors is not abundant enough to conclude, beyond a reasonable
    doubt, that it has occurred. That is why the overwhelming majority of
    Americans still believe in a Creator.

    The foundation of modern science was laid down by devout Christians
    (Galileo, Kepler, Newton, Maxwell, Planck, etc.) who studied nature to know
    more about its Creator. It was the extension of the evolutionary ideas of
    Darwin to an atheistic world view that accentuated the false antagonism
    between science and religion. Such mixing of science, philosophy, and
    theology must be openly discussed. What people object to is the teaching of
    an atheistic world view in the guise of science. Students of faith ought not
    to come out of biology classes with the notion that there is no God.
    Otherwise, theology and not merely biology is being taught in such classes.

    Clearly everything evolves. However, it is not self-evident to me that the
    fundamental question of origins is a truly scientific question. If not, then
    the answer must be sought in the very same places where we seek answers to
    questions regarding meaning, values, and purpose. One must never forget that
    an explanation of the totality of the human experience may lie outside the
    realm of science.

    The honest pursuit of an answer to the question of origins may lead
    ultimately to an Intelligent Designer. Max Planck, Nobel laureate and father
    of quantum physics, said: "God is at the beginning of every religion and at
    the end of the natural sciences." Let us not forget that our nation is
    founded on the creed that our freedom and unalienable rights are endowed by
    our Creator.
    Moorad Alexanian
    University of North Carolina at Wilmington

    ******

    Stephen G. Brush's essay makes some good points about creationism.
    Unfortunately, he repeats some untrue statements about secular humanism that
    have been promoted by televangelists. Secular humanism is a philosophy that
    originated in the Enlightenment. It is based on the idea that a good, moral
    life can be led without the belief in a deity. The humanistic approach is
    that human affairs in the natural world are more important than concerns
    about the supernatural or an afterlife. For example, the US Constitution is
    a famous secular humanist document, in which the government is founded on
    the practical concerns and needs of citizens, rather than requiring a
    religious justification. Humanists base their morality on reason and
    compassion in a way that is consistent with scientific evidence about the
    world and human nature. Although there are not a large number of people who
    call themselves secular humanists, there are a growing number of local
    organizations led by the Council for Secular Humanism in Amherst, NY,
    publisher of Free Inquiry magazine.
    William Creasy
    Abingdon, Maryland

    ******

    I am delighted that Professor Brush has added his name to the regrettably
    small cohort of physicists who take seriously the threat of creationist
    teaching in American public schools. As physicists, we must always bear in
    mind that no matter how specialized our own interests may be, science is a
    seamless whole. This is especially true from the point of view of teaching
    scientific methodology, a vital area which students too often fail to grasp.
    If, for example, biological evolution is "only a theory," why, then, perhaps
    quantum mechanics is "only a theory" as well. I urge physicists to take heed
    of what goes on in their local schools. Those who wish to look into the
    specifics of what goes on in their home states may refer to my recent study,
    Good Science, Bad Science: Teaching Evolution In The States, The Thomas B.
    Fordham Foundation, Washington, D.C., September 2000. Single free copies may
    be obtained by calling 1-888-823-7474; the report is also posted on-line at
    http://www.edexcellence.net.
    Lawrence S. Lerner
    California State University, Long Beach

    ******

    I'm always amazed at the extremes to which Creationists will go in harming
    science education. Yet, in so doing, I believe, they also hurt themselves if
    their goal is to get closer to God. As an Orthodox Jew and a physicist, let
    me give another perspective. One of the most famous Jewish sages and
    legalists, Moses Maimonides (12th century C.E. author of Guide to the
    Perplexed) explained that one very important way to get close to God is to
    learn and understand His creation. This means studying and uncovering the
    mysteries of the physical universe using the tools of science. The models
    scientists create in cosmology or biology may indeed be working hypotheses
    subject to modification as new observations are made, as Brush pointed out.
    But they none-the-less seek the truth and are generated using the very tools
    given by God to man- his mind and senses.

    I'm also amazed at how limited the Creationist view of even the Bible can
    be. They take a simplistic English translation of an original Hebrew text
    and think they can make conclusions from it. Volumes of Biblical exegesis
    have been written trying to understand what the original Hebrew text of
    Genesis means at its various levels. The Jewish view has always held that
    the world is 5761 years old, as counted from the moment a human soul was
    placed in a human body.

    The 13th century talmudist, kabbalist, and physician Rabbi Moshe ben Nachman
    of Gerona, stated that all matter and energy that composes the universe was
    created in the first instant of God's creation. Everything else was formed
    from the basic building blocks of material following the initial creation,
    and follows a general evolutionary trend from simple and chaotic to complex
    and ordered. Furthermore, says R. Nachman, time was created at the initial
    instance of creation, and the universe was created starting as a "small,
    thin, point". All this came many centuries before any Big Bang theory and
    while the rest of Europe thought the world was flat.

    More recently, physicist Gerald Schroeder has written two books (Genesis and
    the Big Bang, Bantam Books, and The Science of God, Broadway Books)
    detailing his thesis that the Biblical version of creation can coexist in
    harmony with the modern standard cosmological model without having to resort
    to a metaphorical understanding of the first chapter in Genesis. He states
    that the first six Genesis days were indeed six twenty-four hour periods of
    time, though measured in a different reference frame, one looking forward in
    time rather than backward as we do now. Time, as viewed dynamically from
    this reference frame with its extreme gravitational potential dilating time,
    behaved very differently from time as measured on earth today. The two
    reference frames came into synch on the sixth Genesis day, when the first
    soul was placed in a human body. I personally would love to see his thesis
    written up as a paper for review in the physics community. Such a paper
    might help me evaluate his thesis better as well as appreciate and
    understand the meaning of this other preferred reference frame.
    Larry Bigio
    University Heights, Ohio

    Paean to Religion Ill-Placed
    In the November 2000 APS News, Freeman Dyson asserts that science and
    religion are both trying to figure out why we are here. But the whys of
    religion and science differ. Science asks why in exploring and understanding
    the physical universe, while the why of religion (discounting the
    creationists) concerns purpose and interposes an undefinable god. Moreover,
    what does Dyson mean by religion? It seems to me to be what the Priests say,
    a domain of shifting meanings, sometimes interpreting of the mysteries of
    (man's place in) the world, other times trying to establish codes of human
    conduct. It is all about indefinable, vague, and shifting notions of god.
    Religion and science do not in fact address the same reality.

    Furthermore, what is this infallible scientific dogma that Dyson uses as a
    straw man? In trying to demonstrate that neither party, scientific or
    religious, holds The Whole Truth, he trivializes the problems of the
    conflict of rationality and God. Dyson seems to resent the fact that
    scientific materialists scorn God, i.e., are insensitive to the religious
    and religion, and hence to morality. But why equate religious beliefs to
    morality? Moreover, it seems unfair to equate the influence of scientific
    materialists and religious creationists. For one thing, their numbers are
    vastly different, even if the media exaggerates their importance. Church and
    state problems are not exaggerated; school prayer and support of religious
    instruction are issues that challenge us everywhere.

    Finally, Dyson praises the social importance of churches and temples in
    Princeton in creating a cohesive and healthy community. The other side of
    the coin can be found in Israel, Afghanistan, Turkey, and in religious
    conflict throughout history. It is highly questionable whether religion is
    the essential mortar in building a diverse, tolerant, and cohesive
    community.

    I can't object to Dyson's desire to warn us of the possible consequences of
    unbridled technology upon life, and that scientists ought to consider moral
    issues of life and humanity. But his paean to religion as the home of a
    beneficent morality and sensitive humanity is ill placed.
    Morton K. Brussel
    Urbana, Illinois

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