Fate and ignorance

Gene Lyons



Posted on Wednesday, December 29, 2004

It is my supposition that the Universe is not

only queerer than we imagine, it is queerer

than we can imagine. —J. B. S. Haldane 



In the popular imagination, influenced by a thousand

Hollywood "sword and sandal" epics inspired by Edward Gibbon’s "Decline

and Fall of the Roman Empire," great nations perish through moral

decay. (The more half-naked slave girls, muscular gladiators and lisping

upper-class twits, the better the box office.) But there’s such a thing

as intellectual decadence, too. The role of sheer ignorance in

determining the fate of civilizations cannot be overstated. Believe it

or not, this insight struck me recently while watching a two minute

"debate" on CNN about the merits of teaching Darwinian evolution vs.

something called "intelligent design" in high school biology classes.



The utter vacuousness of the anchor creature refereeing this exhibition

needn’t be dwelt upon. Suffice it wasn’t her reasoning skills that got

her the job. Rather, it was the farcical nature of the whole enterprise

that struck me: the central organizing principle of biological science

as the shuttlecock in a "Crossfire"-style colloquy between an earnest

young lawyer and a smug preacher who appeared to have borrowed Sen.

Trent Lott’s lacquered hair helmet and dyed it orange.



Not long afterward, The Washington Post chronicled a dispute among

parents and school board members in Dover, Pa., a suburb of Harrisburg.

There, 11 parents, under the aegis of the ACLU, have sued to prevent"

intelligent design" from being foisted upon their children in biology

classes. They claim it’s a smokescreen for teaching fundamentalist

religious doctrine in place of science.



Judging by the newspaper’s account, they’re surely correct. The school

board member who introduced the measure explained that he was taking a

stand for Jesus. Another member, an Assemblies of God pastor, said, "If

the Bible is right, God created us. If God did it, it’s history and

it’s also science."



A local gift shop owner rather evocatively named Lark Myers summed it

all up for the Post reporter: "I definitely would prefer to believe

that God created me than that I’m 50th cousin to a silverback ape. What’s

wrong with wanting our children to hear about all the holes in the

theory of evolution?"



Sigh. The single best answer I’ve seen to all this nonsense was given

by Rev. C. O. Magee, a Presbyterian minister and member of the Little Rock

School Board during a federal court test of an Arkansas

"creation-science" law more than 20 years ago. "Any time religion gets

involved in science," he said, "religion comes off looking like a bunch

of nerds.... The Book of Genesis told who created the world and why it

was created and science tells how it was done."



Can I get an amen? Frankly, I doubt the fair Lark would try to adjust

her own satellite TV receiver without expert help or summon an

Assemblies of God preacher to repair her dishwasher according to

biblical principles. Yet she feels herself competent to pronounce upon

the alleged holes in one of the most massively documented theoretical

constructs in the history of science.



To anybody even faintly aware of what’s going on in the visible world,

biological science has made astonishing advances in recent decades.

Biologists have discovered the structure of the DNA molecule, broken

the genetic code, sequenced the entire genome of several species and

documented with extraordinary specificity how a tiny, single-celled egg

develops into an adult organism.



Paleontologists have unearthed so many so-called missing links in

mammalian evolution that clever creationists now avoid the topic.



Suffice it to say that none of these discoveries would be conceivable

absent the intellectual scaffolding provided by Charles Darwin’s

"Origin of Species" in 1859.



But while Darwin’s insights have been elaborated upon, adjusted,

amplified and corrected over the past century, the panicky response of

his authoritarian-minded opponents has not. Properly understood,

evolution no more mandates atheism than does the tax code, which also

excludes supernatural explanations. Indeed, most "mainstream" religious

denominations have long ago quit seeing science as an enemy, embracing

its discoveries about the grandeur and complexity of the physical

universe as an inducement to reverence and awe. Unfortunately, TV news

networks seeking conflict and melodrama to boost ratings are ill suited

to explore such ideas and emotions. Instead, they peddle simplistic

"controversies" well suited to suburbanites who have lost their way

amid the moral and intellectual confusions of contemporary life and cling to

biblical literalism like a life raft. Sure, a proper curriculum should

include lessons about how science both limits and lays claim to

knowledge about the physical world. And yes, it’s bad for democracy to

have these arguments settled by court mandate instead of reasoned

debate. But it’s also not hard to see why scientists are reluctant to

spend all their time rehashing 19th century misunderstandings on

satellite TV.



• Free-lance columnist Gene Lyons is a Little Rock author and recipient 

of the National Magazine Award.