Below is an except from an interview with Lawrence M. Krauss from the August 2004 issue of Scientific American.
SA: How did science illiteracy become socially acceptable?
LK: We all know how badly science is taught in many
schools. So many middle school and even some high
school teachers have no background in science. When
my daughter was in the second grade and I went to her
school, I was stunned by how her teacher seemed incredibly
uncomfortable with having to teach even the
simplest scientific concepts. I think this is common. And
there is the reality that science has grown increasingly
esoteric, making it more difficult for laypeople to grasp.
The truth isand Im hardly the first to say thisafter
World War II, American scientists became an isolated
elite. The secrets that allowed them to change the
world also allowed them to shirk responsibility for citizenship.
Scientists became a class above society, rather
than a part of it.
And so for the longest time, certainly until the 1970s,
many American scientists just didnt believe that reaching
the public was important. Those were good times,
with lots of money coming in. The wake-up call came in
1993, when Congress killed the Superconducting Super
Collider. That was a real signal physicists were doing
something wrong.
We hadnt convinced the publicor even all of our
colleaguesthat it was worth billions to build this thing.
And since then, it has become clear: to get money for
what we do, were going to have to explain it to the public.
My predilection is to try to connect the interesting
ideas in science to the rest of peoples lives.
SA: The big public issue youve been identified with is
fighting against creationist teachings in the schools. For
the past couple years, youve spent your time traveling,
debating creationists on proposed curriculum changes
for Ohios high schools. Was that fun?
LK: It was the least fun of anything Ive ever done. Convincing
people of the excitement of science is fun; trying
to stave off attacks on science feels like the most incredible
waste of time, even if necessary.
I got drafted after several creationists were appointed
to the Standards Committee of the Ohio State Board
of Education. They were proposing new standards to
create false controversy around evolution by introducing
an ad hoc idea called intelligent design into high
school science classes.
For nearly a year, I found myself in the middle of
what was almost the equivalent of a political campaign.
When it was over, we won and we lost. We won because
we had kept intelligent design out of science classes. We
lost because in the spirit of fairness, the board added
a sentence to the standards saying, Students should
learn how scientists are continuing to critically examine
evolutionary theory. I strongly opposed this. I wanted
them to say that scientists are continuing to critically examine
everything.
As I feared, this sentence opened the door for the creationists
claiming that there is controversy about the accuracy
of evolutionary theory. And its come back to
haunt us. Just the other week, I had to put everything I
was doing aside because the creationists were back at
their old games again in Ohio. One of the model lessons
that came out was an intelligent-design diatribe. Basically,
they snuck the whole thing in again, through the
back door. This becomes so tiresome that you just want
to say, Forget about it, go on. But then you realize
that this is exactly what Phillip Johnson, this lawyer who
first proposed the intelligent-design strategy, proposed
when he said something like, Well just keep going and
going and going till we outlast the evolutionists.
SA: Do scientists trap themselves when they try to be
fair and give equal time in their debates with the
anti-Darwinists?
LK: Yes. Because science isnt fair. Its testable. In science,
we prove things by empirical methods, and we toss
out things that have been disproved as wrong. Period.
This is how we make progress.
Im not against teaching faith-based ideas in religion
classes; Im just against teaching them as if they were science.
And it disturbs me when someone like Bill Gates,
whose philanthropy I otherwise admire, helps finance
one of the major promoters of intelligent design by giving
money to a largely conservative think tank called the
Discovery Institute. Yes, they got a recent grant from the
Gates Foundation. Its true that the almost $10-million
grant, which is the second they received from Gates,
doesnt support intelligent design, but it does add credibility
to a group whose goals and activities are, based on
my experiences with them, intellectually suspect. During
the science standards debate in Ohio, institute operatives
constantly tried to suggest that there was controversy
about evolution where there wasnt and framed the debate
in terms of a fairness issue, which it isnt. [Editors
note: Amy Low, a media relations officer representing
the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, says that the
foundation has decided not to respond to Dr. Krausss
comments.]
SA: Why do you find this grant so particularly disturbing
that you single it out here?
LK: Because were living in a time when so many scientific
questions are transformed into public relations campaigns
with truth going out the window in favor of
sound bites and manufactured controversies. This is
dangerous to science and society, because what we learn
from observation and testing cant be subject to negotiation
or spin, as so much in politics is.
The creationists cut at the very credibility of science
when they cast doubt on our methods. When they do
that, they make it easier to distort scientific findings in
controversial policy areas.
We can see that happening right now with issues
like stem cells, abortion, global warming and missile
defense. When the testing of the proposed missile defense
system showed it didnt work, the Pentagons answer,
more or less, went, No more tests before we
build it.
Excerpt from an interview with Lawrence M. Krauss, Page 84-85, "Questions That Plague Physics", Scientific American, August 2004.
My point? Creationism, ID, etc, are not science and shouldn't be treated as such. Part of the problem is a general lack of good science education in school. Also science and politics shouldn't be ixed.
SA: How did science illiteracy become socially acceptable?
LK: We all know how badly science is taught in many
schools. So many middle school and even some high
school teachers have no background in science. When
my daughter was in the second grade and I went to her
school, I was stunned by how her teacher seemed incredibly
uncomfortable with having to teach even the
simplest scientific concepts. I think this is common. And
there is the reality that science has grown increasingly
esoteric, making it more difficult for laypeople to grasp.
The truth isand Im hardly the first to say thisafter
World War II, American scientists became an isolated
elite. The secrets that allowed them to change the
world also allowed them to shirk responsibility for citizenship.
Scientists became a class above society, rather
than a part of it.
And so for the longest time, certainly until the 1970s,
many American scientists just didnt believe that reaching
the public was important. Those were good times,
with lots of money coming in. The wake-up call came in
1993, when Congress killed the Superconducting Super
Collider. That was a real signal physicists were doing
something wrong.
We hadnt convinced the publicor even all of our
colleaguesthat it was worth billions to build this thing.
And since then, it has become clear: to get money for
what we do, were going to have to explain it to the public.
My predilection is to try to connect the interesting
ideas in science to the rest of peoples lives.
SA: The big public issue youve been identified with is
fighting against creationist teachings in the schools. For
the past couple years, youve spent your time traveling,
debating creationists on proposed curriculum changes
for Ohios high schools. Was that fun?
LK: It was the least fun of anything Ive ever done. Convincing
people of the excitement of science is fun; trying
to stave off attacks on science feels like the most incredible
waste of time, even if necessary.
I got drafted after several creationists were appointed
to the Standards Committee of the Ohio State Board
of Education. They were proposing new standards to
create false controversy around evolution by introducing
an ad hoc idea called intelligent design into high
school science classes.
For nearly a year, I found myself in the middle of
what was almost the equivalent of a political campaign.
When it was over, we won and we lost. We won because
we had kept intelligent design out of science classes. We
lost because in the spirit of fairness, the board added
a sentence to the standards saying, Students should
learn how scientists are continuing to critically examine
evolutionary theory. I strongly opposed this. I wanted
them to say that scientists are continuing to critically examine
everything.
As I feared, this sentence opened the door for the creationists
claiming that there is controversy about the accuracy
of evolutionary theory. And its come back to
haunt us. Just the other week, I had to put everything I
was doing aside because the creationists were back at
their old games again in Ohio. One of the model lessons
that came out was an intelligent-design diatribe. Basically,
they snuck the whole thing in again, through the
back door. This becomes so tiresome that you just want
to say, Forget about it, go on. But then you realize
that this is exactly what Phillip Johnson, this lawyer who
first proposed the intelligent-design strategy, proposed
when he said something like, Well just keep going and
going and going till we outlast the evolutionists.
SA: Do scientists trap themselves when they try to be
fair and give equal time in their debates with the
anti-Darwinists?
LK: Yes. Because science isnt fair. Its testable. In science,
we prove things by empirical methods, and we toss
out things that have been disproved as wrong. Period.
This is how we make progress.
Im not against teaching faith-based ideas in religion
classes; Im just against teaching them as if they were science.
And it disturbs me when someone like Bill Gates,
whose philanthropy I otherwise admire, helps finance
one of the major promoters of intelligent design by giving
money to a largely conservative think tank called the
Discovery Institute. Yes, they got a recent grant from the
Gates Foundation. Its true that the almost $10-million
grant, which is the second they received from Gates,
doesnt support intelligent design, but it does add credibility
to a group whose goals and activities are, based on
my experiences with them, intellectually suspect. During
the science standards debate in Ohio, institute operatives
constantly tried to suggest that there was controversy
about evolution where there wasnt and framed the debate
in terms of a fairness issue, which it isnt. [Editors
note: Amy Low, a media relations officer representing
the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, says that the
foundation has decided not to respond to Dr. Krausss
comments.]
SA: Why do you find this grant so particularly disturbing
that you single it out here?
LK: Because were living in a time when so many scientific
questions are transformed into public relations campaigns
with truth going out the window in favor of
sound bites and manufactured controversies. This is
dangerous to science and society, because what we learn
from observation and testing cant be subject to negotiation
or spin, as so much in politics is.
The creationists cut at the very credibility of science
when they cast doubt on our methods. When they do
that, they make it easier to distort scientific findings in
controversial policy areas.
We can see that happening right now with issues
like stem cells, abortion, global warming and missile
defense. When the testing of the proposed missile defense
system showed it didnt work, the Pentagons answer,
more or less, went, No more tests before we
build it.
Excerpt from an interview with Lawrence M. Krauss, Page 84-85, "Questions That Plague Physics", Scientific American, August 2004.
My point? Creationism, ID, etc, are not science and shouldn't be treated as such. Part of the problem is a general lack of good science education in school. Also science and politics shouldn't be ixed.
