Science Teaching

by tristero

PZ Myers heartily recc’ds this paper by Massimo Pigliucci entitled, “The Evolution-Creation Wars: Why Teaching More Science Just Is Not Enough,” and it really is worthwhile. PZ goes over much of it but two specific points struck me as especially worth discussing here.

In one section, Pigliucci quantifies the notion that more education – even better education with better explanations of, say, evolution – will not necessarily convince anyone of anything. This kind of insight is nothing new among us humanities types but – to be as obnoxiously condescending as I can be about it – it’s simply charming to find it expressed by Pigliucci in language science people can grok (grin).*

Before you can teach something genuinely new, you first need to have students who know how to think critically about ideas, concepts, facts, and even things as seemingly unambiguous as visible, normal, everyday, physical reality. Pigliucci has some surprising data about how science majors are not necessarily any more critical thinkers than non-science majors. But once he informs you that science majors are not taught the basics of critical thinking, it’s not that surprising.

However, it is one thing to recognize that critical thinking must be taught, it’s quite another to figure out when and how. College is way too late. Of course, critical skills “should” be taught from the getgo, but formally, I think middle school is around right, as kids are beginning to put together a sense of themselves. That is the earliest time that I think it is vitally important that they receive good, organized instruction in how to go about evaluating all the complex messages – both good and bad – this culture is hellbent on sending their way.

At the college level, Pigliucci’s data, while preliminary, strongly suggests to me the notion that advanced critical thinking may be, to some extent, aided and abetted by the kind of education the study of humanities can provide. Don’t get me wrong. I’m not saying the humanities should be taught for utilitarian reasons – that is, for many reasons too long to go into here, sheer nonsense. However, it does so happen that when you carefully study a novel like, say, Pale Fire, you can easily end up casting a very critical eye, or at least a sardonic one, on rhetorical devices that are employed to assert a bogus authority. And that is precisely the kind of skeptical attitude you will not get from the kind of “here are the facts” science teaching Pigliucci rightly deplores.

Another point, one that PZ doesn’t mention, but which I was really struck by, is Pigliucci’s call to establish in this country university chairs similar to the one Dawkins holds in England, namely a position in “The Public Understanding of Science.” What a fantastic idea! And it’s precisely the kind of idea that wealthy graduates might be willing to privately fund.

Dawkins has been an important voice for many years now in popularizing science. But recently, by deliberately courting world-class controversy, he has made “public understanding of science” a topic of wide interest and concern to a huge public. That is exactly the right thing to do, and the more knowledgeable and articulate people who do that, the better. It’s not that Dawkins is right or wrong (although on many things, I think he is absolutely right). It’s that the way Dawkins – dare I say it? – frames things that makes people discuss the issues, and maybe even, every once in a while, think about them, even to vehemently disagree with him.

That is quite an achievement. We need an American Dawkins. We need many of them. And if they disagree about what a “public understanding of science” should be, let us hope they disagree LOUDLY. Why? Well, for one thing, when really smart, knowledgeable people argue with passion, it is truly a wonderful sight to behold.

For another, it’s worth it. The public’s need to understand science – and scientists’ need to understand what the public knows – is a critically vital topic, one that directly impacts the political and cultural issues that are creating so many problems right now.

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*On the web, one has to be careful about indulging in affectionate tweaks of another cat’s whiskers, but sometimes I can’t resist. I certainly hope that the enormous respect I hold for science and scientists is obvious in all my posts about the Other of the The Two Cultures. And part of that respect entails being amused when what is patently obvious and important to me and others in the arts is suddenly found to be of surprising importance to my intellectual betters.