Should evolution be taught in schools?

Transcript

This is an AI-generated transcript and may contain some errors.
Hare Krishna. Should evolution be taught in schools? Answer.
Yes, we all know that the Union Minister of State, Satpal Singh, triggered a furor recently by saying that evolution is not scientifically proven and that it shouldn’t be taught in schools. So, should evolution be taught? Before we can answer this question, we need to understand what evolution means. This word is multivalent and it has different meanings in different contexts.
So, in today’s public discourse, broadly the word evolution is used to refer to three distinct things. First is adaptation of species. Second is the transformation of one species to another leading to the emergence of new species.
And third is all explaining naturalistic ideology. So, let us look at these three meanings of evolution and then we will address the question about their scientific validity and appropriateness of their being taught in school curricula. So, first is evolution as the adaptation of species.
Almost all the textbooks when they talk about evolution and almost all the scientific papers when they talk about evolution and when they offer hard evidence, the evidence that they offer actually is for adaptation of species. That means when species are exposed to environment which are difficult to live in, then they adapt themselves. So, for example, plants and animals living in desert areas develop features by which they can store water and thus be resilient in that water scarce area.
So, this is beyond dispute and doubt and there is no problem with teaching this. But by its own arrangement, nature has endowed living beings with the capacity to adapt themselves to their environments. So, this level is the evidence available and this level can be taught.
It is just a natural observation of a well-documented phenomena. Now evolution also refers to the transformation of species leading to the emergence of all species. Normally when we see the evolutionary chart from say monkeys to humans, then this is what people get in their mind when they talk about evolution.
So, the fact that one species changes itself can be called as microevolution. Whereas the idea that one species will change into another species is macroevolution. And the evidence for microevolution for variation within species does not validly apply as evidence for variation across species.
Most of the evidence is offered for macroevolution whereas what is claimed and what is portrayed as proven is macroevolution. Now there is no visible demonstration of any macroevolution happening entirely by unguided natural processes. So, of course, paleontologists, those scientists who study the past, especially through fossils, they dismiss such objections by saying that this process of macroevolution is so slow that it cannot be visible to human eyes.
Then if it is so slow, what is the hard evidence? They say it’s the fossil record. That in the fossils we can find the species having been evolved. However, much of the evidence that is portrayed as evidence was subsequently pointed out to be false.
Lucy was portrayed as the missing link, for example, between humans and their primates, the apes. But it was proven to be a hoax, it was not actually an evidence. And the fossil record does not support the idea of macroevolution, species changing from one to another.
And this shortage of evidence coming from the fossil records is admitted by evolutionists themselves. Let’s look at quotes by two prominent evolutionists who state the problems with the fossil record. So, here we have one of the most prominent evolutionists, that is Stephen Gould.
And he says that the fossil record is remarkably consistent. It is consistent in that what is sought is always absent. Consistently the missing links are missing.
So, now of course he is an evolutionist by belief and that’s why he doesn’t reject evolution, rather he comes up with some other theory to explain the absence of the fossils. But whether that theory explains the absence of fossils is debatable. And this is because of the lack of proper undisputable evidence and because of a lack of proper theoretical framework, the questions about the validity of the theory of evolution need to be raised.
Of course, there are hardline evolutionists and especially aggressive atheists who claim that evolution is completely proven and that anyone who opposes evolution is a religious bigot, religious fanatic and anti-scientific person who wants to take people back to the stone age. But embarrassingly for such atheists, many among those who oppose evolution are scientists, credentialed scientists with degrees from prominent universities all over the world. If you visit the site Descent from Darwin, there you will find a list of more than 800 scientists who have expressed strong reservations about the theory of evolution as an adequate explanation for the emergence of all life.
So, this debate about the validity of evolution as an adequate explanation for the emergence of all species exists in science. And therefore, the existence of this debate needs to be acknowledged in the textbooks. So, rather than presenting evolution as a proven theory, it can be taught as one possible explanation along with the objections to that explanation which are raised by the critics of evolution.
Now, beyond this, evolution is also used as a shorthand to refer to a naturalistic philosophy. Evolution becomes an all-explaining naturalist alternative for invoking anything higher, for explaining the cosmos. And this is the level where evolution needs to be strongly contested.
Evolution cannot explain first and foremost the beginning itself. What Darwin proposed was biological evolution. But even he said that how in the beginning life came about was beyond his scope.
So, one species changing into another is called biological evolution. And the original life form coming from chemicals is called as chemical evolution. And for evolution to be an all-explaining naturalistic alternative for accounting for the world, it now claims to be a grand evolutionary synthesis that includes biological evolution and chemical evolution.
But for chemicals to evolve into the first life form, whatever it may have been, even if it is a microbe, for it, consciousness needs to evolve. And if consciousness needs to evolve, how does it evolve? There is no account for the emergence of consciousness. If we search for scientific explanations for the evolution of consciousness, there are no satisfactory explanations at all.
And this is admitted by an authority no less than a prominent Nobel laureate scientist. He states that if we look at the naturalistic alternatives, Nobel prize-winning neurophysiologist Sir John Eccles says, if you look at most modern texts on evolution, you will find nothing about mind and consciousness. They assume it just comes automatically with the development of the brain.
But that’s not the answer. Similarly, another prominent physicist Nick Herbert, in his book Quantum Reality Beyond the New Physics states, science’s biggest mystery is the nature of consciousness. It is not that we possess bad or imperfect theories of human awareness.
We simply have no such theories at all. About all we know about consciousness is that it has something to do with the head rather than the foot. Actually, when evolution is made into an all-explaining ideology, then it no longer remains science.
It becomes an ideology. And it’s called scientism, the imperialism of science when it encroaches into other branches of knowledge. And Wolfgang Smith, who is a philosopher of science states, Darwinism in whatever form is not in fact a scientific theory, but a pseudo metaphysical hypothesis decked out in scientific garb.
In reality, the theory derives its support not from empirical data or logical deductions of a scientific kind, but from the circumstances that it happens to be the only doctrine of biological origins that can be conceived with the constricted worldview to which a majority of scientists no doubt subscribe. So, in simple words, he is saying, this is not a theory that has come from evidence or inference. It is the only explanation which naturalists can argue.
And this is coming from, can accept. And this comes from their worldview. That worldview is philosophical naturalism.
This worldview holds that all natural phenomena must be explained in terms of naturalistic causes. So, all material things must be explained in terms of material causes. And there cannot be anything non-material involved.
However, this naturalistic philosophy, what to speak of it being an adequate explanation for any particular phenomena in nature, it cannot explain science itself. What does that mean? Science, there is a difference between what science explains and what explains science. So, what explains science means that, sorry, what science explains means that say Newton saw a fruit falling.
And then he saw that fruit falling. He asked, what made this fruit fall? And then he came up with the theory of gravity. So, what happened over here is, there was an observation of a natural phenomena of fruit falling.
And science gave an explanation for that phenomena in terms of the principle of gravity. But if we go back further and ask, why did Newton ask the question, what made this fruit fall? That was because he presumed that there was an order in nature, according to which things happen, according to which fruits fall. Now, why should there be an order in nature at all? If there were no order in nature, then there could be no science.
Because science basically uncovers the order that is already existing in nature. And the naturalistic worldview, which says that everything emerged from fundamental particles by unguided natural processes, cannot explain why there should be any order in nature at all. So, this is admitted again by prominent researchers.
So, physicist Paul Davies points out, science can proceed only if scientists adopt an essentially theological worldview. Even the most atheistic scientist accepts as an act of faith the existence of a law-like order in nature that is at least in part comprehensible to us. So, he is saying two things, that nature has an order and that we can understand that order.
These two are founding assumptions. And what is the basis of this faith? Logically, we could say that this faith can be present only when we presume the existence of some higher intelligence who has infused nature with that order. So, that’s why Paul Davies says that scientists have to approach an essentially theistic approach.
Have to adopt a theistic approach. Now, moving forward, actually speaking, when science observes natural phenomena and then gives a name to the underlying factors that cause that phenomena, is that really an explanation or is that simply a description? So, if say Ajay hits Vijay, and now I describe Ajay’s fist rose up, went back and came and hit Vijay on the right jaw and Vijay fell down with blood spurting out of his mouth. Now, this is a description of the event.
This is not an explanation of the motivation that made Vijay hit the punch like that. Isn’t it? So, now if I give a name to this phenomena, if I say the way Ajay hit Vijay, I use the word uppercut to describe it. Yes, I may say, how did Ajay cause Vijay to fall? By uppercut.
Okay. That’s a description of what happened. Naming a phenomena doesn’t explain the phenomena.
It just gives a name to the phenomena. So, similarly, we may say gravity is what causes fruits to fall. But why is gravity present in nature at all? So, gravity is simply a name given to a pre-existing phenomena and giving a name to a phenomena doesn’t explain the phenomena.
And this is pointed out by German philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein. The great delusion of modernity is that the laws of nature explain the universe for us. The laws of nature describe the universe.
They describe the regularities, but they explain nothing. That’s why the idea that we can through natural, unguided natural processes such as evolution is conceived to be, explain everything in nature, that is unscientific. That cannot be accepted as science.
It is, as I said earlier, scientism. It’s an ideology masquerading as science. And that is how atheists misappropriate science to promote atheism.
But such misappropriation is a disservice to science and a disservice to students who are being educated in science. There are valid questions which science can answer and there are valid questions which science can’t answer. Science can answer about how natural phenomena function.
But why natural phenomena function that way is something beyond the scope of science. And to claim that there is nothing beyond the scope of science is unscientific. Again, this is pointed out by another Nobel laureate scientist himself, who actually was an atheist.
And yet, he cautions, Nobel laureate Sir Peter Medawar tells scientists in his book, Advice to a Young Scientist, there is no quicker way for a scientist to bring discredit upon himself and upon his profession than roundly to declare, particularly when no declaration of any kind is called for, that science knows or soon will know the answers to all questions worth asking. And that questions which do not admit a scientific answer are in some ways, non-questions or pseudo-questions that only simpletons ask and only the gullible profess to be able to answer. So, to summarize, should evolution be taught in schools? If evolution refers to the adaptation of species, yes, it can definitely be taught.
If evolution refers to the emergence of new species and the transformation of one species into another, then that is scientifically debatable. And this debate which exists in mainstream science needs to be depicted in the, needs to be accurately represented in the science curricula. And evolution as an all-explaining ideology, it is unscientific.
It is a misrepresentation of reality, it is a misappropriation of science and it is miseducation of science students. So, evolution as an all-explaining ideology definitely needs to be contested and corrected. Thank you.