Re: RATE Vol. II

>>> Mervin Bitikofer <mrb22667@kansas.net> 05/23/06 7:53 AM >>>writes:

In the spirit of Iain's gentle exhortation, I wish to add a challenge &
seek advice. Probably, most of you (by your own good design, no doubt)
are in career positions which limit your contacts with YEC advocates to
non-professional settings. I.e. you can safely be aggressive about
'eradicating' young-earth heresies from Christendom, and in fact, to the
extent that YEC topics ever come up - you would be required to respond
that way under the pressure of jeopardizing your career path. (NO - I
am NOT imputing false motives to any of you here - I am NOT suggesting
that the only reason you think as you do is for career advance; I agree
fully that your career would be rightly jeopardized by a YE position on
the sound grounds that scientific evidence is clearly against it.) <big
SNIP>

****

Ted comments:
Mervin, my own situation is somewhat in between yours and mine. I
understand yours, as I was once a science teacher at a fundamentalist
Christian high school. At that time, in the mid to late 70s, YECism had not
yet made as many inroads into the church. Nevertheless my dept chair (an
alum of Bob Jones Univ) was a staunch YEC. My headmaster, however, was not
a YEC--he had a Westminster Seminary degree and took the concordist approach
that was popular in conservative reformed circles. I moved in the same
circles and took the same approach. I started a month-long unit on science
and the Bible in my 11th grade chemistry course, and followed Bernard Ramm's
approach and attitude to a great extent. I liked "progressive creation" as
he called it (he did not invent that term, although many seem to assume that
he did), and taught that to my students as the best option.

Whether I could do that now, at a similar school, is unclear to me. Since
the 1980s creationism has really advanced, partly I think owing to the
"culture wars" and partly b/c they produce such slick publications and web
materials--which pander to a certain mindset and audience that includes
virtually no people with real scientific educations. Fighting against this
is not easy, as we all know.

My present situation places me in classes populated by students who are at
least heavily (perhaps as much as half the group) followers of the YEC view.
 Many who hold that view hold it quite loosely; they have frankly never
heard anything good about any other possibility. The typical YEC strategy
paints anything to the left of Ken Ham as theologically heretical and
religiously dangerous. I call this the "demonization" of evolution, and
it's been going on for a long time--even Bryan, who was an OEC not a YEC,
had this attitude, and Henry Morris was actually far worse in this respect.
My insitution did not promote me on the basis of my opposition to YEC,
however, and if I were a YEC I would still be teaching here (I hope, and I
think). I am a rare bird in this forest: I have genuine intellectual and
academic freedom to say and teach whatever I think on this issue. My
approach is to show students, as sympathetically as I can, multiple models
-- including the YEC model, which I do not criticize too strongly b/c I want
students to do their own thinking, not to mimic mine. "I am not interested
in cloning myself," I tell my students repeatedly. "I am interested in
seeing you do your own thinking on this issue." If my students come to YEC
conclusions, and some of them do at the end of the course, I'm fine with
that as long as they understand some of the problems with that position.
Likewise for forms of OEC, TE, and ID. I will be speaking about
this--teaching origins--at the ASA meeting this summer.

If there is any way you can do something similar, I urge you to do so. My
approach is very effective at getting students to think, not to memorize or
parrot but to think. And some very thoughtful students decide that YEC
still makes the most sense to them, for reasons they articulate clearly and
fairly. Others think it's time to move on to something more in tune with
science, and if they can also articulate their reasons for this I am happy.
I'm an educator, not an evangelist for my opinions. I do "profess" where
appropriate, but I don't mold my course around my opinions and don't want
students to follow me blindly any more than they would follow Ham or Morris
blindly.

I wish you well,

Ted
Received on Tue May 23 15:26:45 2006