Did the National Science Teaching Association Just Muzzle … Darwin?
What happens when someone tries to present to the National Science Teaching Association (NSTA) Charles Darwin’s top arguments against his own theory? Herman Bouma, founder of the National Association for Objectivity in Science, knows from personal experience. As he relates to host Casey Luskin on this ID the Future, he recently had a poster presentation on the topic accepted for an NSTA conference, but then a defender of Darwinian orthodoxy rushed in and spiked it. Bouma describes the censored presentation and the Kafkaesque back and forth he says he had with the organizer, who ultimately shut him down. Bouma warns of what has been described as the “Censorship Industrial Complex,” but he also says he hasn’t given up trying to open up hearts and minds at the NSTA. The incident Bouma describes in this episode echoes an earlier one, which Bouma describes in this 2019 podcast episode.
How a Teacher Wrecked Biology for Me, and How I Got Past It
On today’s ID the Future, Tom Gilson, a writer and editor for The Stream, shares his experiences in high school biology. Important mysteries (i.e., major problems) with evolutionary theory were hurried past and papered over, and yet his biology teacher could take an entire class period to tell Charles Darwin’s life story, and then repeat the same class, virtually verbatim, five more times that same semester. Tune in to hear how the class put Tom Gilson off of biology, but how he now finds the subject fascinating, thanks to the work of intelligent design researchers and the larger community of life scientists. Gilson’s commentary is taken from, and builds on, a recent essay of his, available at Evolution News.
A Plea to Parents: Don’t “Butt Out” of Your Kids’ Education
On today’s ID the Future, host Robert Crowther sits down with writer Andrew McDiarmid to discuss his recent New York Post article, “Word to the Wise: Progressives Forget that Parents are in Charge of Kids’ Education.” The two discuss recent dustups in the news in which parents were told to butt out of the public education of their children. This is profoundly wrongheaded and for a variety of reasons, McDiarmid argues. McDiarmid, a Discovery Institute senior fellow, advocates for greater parental involvement, rather than less, and he and Crowther then apply the principle to the narrower question of how evolution is taught in the public high schools. In many districts evolutionary theory is taught as unquestionable dogma, with none of the theory’s weaknesses presented, and no attempt to encourage critical inquiry into the matter. Parents, students, and education leaders should never settle for this, McDiarmid says. He and Crowther wrap up their conversation by pointing listeners to several quality educational resources, many of them online, to help parents, students, and educators.
NCSE Pushes Unscientific Pro-Darwin Survey
On this episode of ID the Future, Robert Crowther interviews Sarah Chaffee, Education and Public Policy Program Officer for the Center for Science and Culture, on a recent survey conducted by the dogmatically pro-Darwin National Center for Science Education (NCSE), and published in Nature. The NCSE claims that the survey shows that science teachers “advocate evolution” even more now than in 2007. But as Crowther and Chaffe’s discussion suggests, the survey appears gamed to produce a pro-Darwinist outcome, so much so that even teachers who follow the Discovery Institute’s policy of promoting critical thinking skills by teaching biology students both the strengths and weaknesses of modern evolutionary theory could be counted as evolution advocates by the survey. Then too, as Crowther and Chaffee further note, how likely are biology teachers with doubts about modern Darwinism to participate in a survey by an organization famously instrumental in attacking Darwin-doubting biology teachers?