ask no evil, see no evil, publish no evil…

Every two years, the National Science Foundation conducts a very basic survey of scientific literacy in the U.S., then publishes their results in their Science and Engineering Indicators report. And over the years, staggering numbers of people answered that they gave no merit to the theory of evolution or to modern cosmology. Every edition had to show that the majority of Americans were behind other industrialized nations in recognizing that today’s key scientific theories aren’t just random guessing and come with far more evidence than what they’re told at churches every Sunday, every edition until this one. But it’s not because there’s some kind of big flip in the statistics. No, the NSF simply decided to omit its questions on evolution and the Big Bang theory and their poll numbers from the 2010 report, seemingly following the premise that if we don’t talk about the problem, it’ll eventually go away on its own and we can all ignore the fundamentalists’ damage to our school systems…

The funny part is that the reasons for not only including, but prominently highlighting these numbers as major red flags, were used to justify their omission. Review board member and philosopher John Bruer took note of the fact that the relevant questions asked respondents to choose between scientific data and religious beliefs rather than simply evaluating their understanding of evolution or cosmology. And to some extend, he’s right. If you ask someone whether they think “the universe began with a huge explosion,” you’re probably going to get some very confused glances even from physicists who study the subject. The question is too general and very poorly worded. However, the question about evolution which sought to see if the respondents agreed with the idea that “humans as we know them today developed from earlier species of animals” is pretty much spot on. So while 67% of Americans might disagree that the universe began with a huge explosion and have a decent scientific reason to do so depending on their description of the Big Bang, a 55% rejection of a question about basic speciation does not bode well, especially in comparison to many other developed countries.

Even if we do give the NSF some leeway, we find that their actions effectively hide the elephant in the room. In our culture, we’re supposed to respect religious fundamentalists because of their beliefs and told to view their efforts in classrooms and in the public as the actions of really caring people just trying to do something for the greater good. However, what we’ve really done is to bestow inordinate amounts of undeserved good feelings on the kind of movements which quite literally want to drag us back into the Dark Ages. When religion is seen as a metaphorical realm to be understood only with a thorough analysis of the natural world, as was done by the scientific luminaries accommodationist groups love to praise, society moves forward. This is how Newton and Bruno could contribute so much to science while staying true to their beliefs. By contrast, today’s fiery and hysterical fundamentalist zealots seek to stamp out all the curiosity, learning and discovery that could possibly contradict their own views. Be they members of school boards, or run multi-million dollar groups devoted to institutionalized anti-scientific lying, the fundamentalists’ goal is to silence scientists so they get to live in the reality free bubble they need to hold on to their beliefs. And as the NSF’s surveys show, we’re paying for giving them so much leeway by discarding basic scientific literacy.

It seems rather odd that in American culture, all sorts of New Age woo which clumsily borrows from a few very old and complex Eastern philosophies, then assembles them into a hodgepodge of pseudoscience and loud admissions of ignorance ala Deepak Chopra and alt med mavens abusing basic physics, is dismissed with solid logic and evidence while fundamentalists’ inane proclamations are rarely challenged. If you laugh at the self-important hipster meowing about higher realms of consciousness and how in tune with nature he is, why wouldn’t you do the same with arrogant fundamentalists spewing ignorance in a public forum? Our failures to do just that results in a population that’s either ignorant of basic science, or treats it with hostile outbursts and indignant, condescending speeches on the importance of blind, self-righteous faith over reason and learning outside of a narrow circle of people who’ve been trading the same ancient legends for thousands of years as they demanded respect and obedience from everyone around them.