We recently had a brief visitation by a poster called Dr. Robert T. Bakker. I have to admit that I am not familiar with Dr. Bakker's work other than through the prominence of theories with which he has had close association such as endothermy in dinosaurs and the evolution of birds.
Dr. Bakker made a post in reply to the first, and long forgotten, OP in the thread formerly known as 'Abusive Assumptions', unfortunately this thread had long ago gone terminally off topic and was being speedily rushed towards the flexible but terminal wall of the ~300 posts mark.
Faith was a bit dissapointed on the lack of response to Dr. Bakker's post, and I thought it was an interesting and strongly put comment on the problem of people trying to get the own atheistic or religious views pedalled in science classes.
I thought it might be appropriate to open up a thread in a forum where Faith can actually post so that anyone who is interested can discuss Dr. Bakker's post and any connected thoughts. This will also mean there is somewhere relevant for Dr. Bakker to post when/if he returns.
I have quoted Dr. Bakker's text in full below, let me know if a link to the original post would be more appropriate.
Dr. Robert T. Bakker, Morrison Museum zorilla47@aol.com
Bones Bibles & Creation:
No Public Dollars For Atheism ...(Or I.D.)
While a visiting Prof at St. Johns-St. Benedicts College in Minnesota, I was the guest moderator at the required Freshman seminar. Topic: Richard Dawkin’s books on why evolution proves that the only honest philosophy is
Atheism.
Dawkins is the Oxford Professor who was so proud of being an atheist that he decided to re-label the category Atheists.
We’ll call ourselves the ‘Brights.’ By implication, anyone who wasn’t an atheist was "A Dull".
A lot of us working scientists preferred to call Dawkins and friends the Smugs.
The kids in the seminar eyed me warily. .paleontologist.digs fossils.writes for Scientific American I could just barely hear some low decibel interchanges. .must be a Darwinistmust be a Bible-basher
The official faculty leader tried to get the conversation going. No luck. The students fidgeted, avoided eye contact. There was a long pause. Then I slammed Dawkins down on the table and yelled
This guy is a @#** self-puff artist! He knows NOTHING about the history of science! He’s dead wrong about how evolutionary studies grew up. And when he warbles on about the Church and how it suppresses scientific inquiry..
He makes as much sense as an apoplectic Donald Duck!!!
The floodgates opened. Turned out that most of the students, Catholic and Protestant and independent agnostic, hated Dawkins’ snobbish tone. Most hadn’t had a college-level bio course. So they couldn’t judge the genetic arguments. But they smelled an overbearing smug-ness on every page. I cited my trump card:
What about St. Augustine — he wrote lots on Creation. Inspired Catholic scholars — Bible translators, archaeologists, philosophers
The kids raised in Catholic schools sheepishly admitted that they’d forgotten what little they’d been given of St. Augustine.
I pulled my battered City of God out of my vest and read some neat passages about Doctrine and astronomy. Augustine really sings when he combines Nature with Scripture. He loved spiders and rabbits and saw created beauty even in a biting sand fly. And he lectured new converts that they should appreciate real science, even when taught by a Pagan.
I rattled off a long list of scientists supported by established Churches. Dinosaur-diggers. Geologists. Anatomists.
Since I was in a Catholic school, I emphasized the long, splendid tradition of free inquiry, going back to the first universities in the 12th century, started by Catholics at Paris and Oxford.
Galileo and his Papal problems? Didn’t the Church persecute him because he disagreed with Biblical astronomy?
Not really. Galileo was a brilliant scientist but bad politician. He thumbed his nose at Papal officials when the Pope was engaged in a costly war and delicate multi-national politics. The Papacy was slow to apologize, because it didn’t forget Galileo’s abusive personal style. Still, official Papal astronomers were already using Galilean theories while the guy was in house arrest.
The faculty lead in the Freshman course at St. Johns-St. Bens wasn’t a Catholic — or even a practicing Christian. But he was a fine & fair teacher. He kept the grilling of Dawkins going. He also did the evolutionary biology and paleontology courses.
I don’t whether any student atheist was converted to being an agnostic. Or Lutheran to Catholic. Or Green Bay Packer fan to the Denver Broncos. Or vice versa. But all the kids were given more weapons to expose hype and fraud among scholars.
How To Combat Smug Atheism in Schools:
Laws intended to cool off Darwinism in public schools are aimed at Dawkins-types. Actually, it’s un-Constitutional to use public dollars to pay someone to preach atheism. But it’s also un-Constitutional to use tax $’s to preach Intelligent Design. Intelligent Design IS religious. Its leaders state that. Intelligent Design was invented as a wedge to begin proving Christian doctrine from Nature.
In the battle between Dawkins’ Atheism and Phillip Johnson’s Intelligent Design, we’re not allowed to use public money to promote either. Neither is science.
So what do we do?
Teach History!
History gets short shrift. We all need more history — teachers, students, politicians. The St. Johns course is a fine example. Atheist claims were rigorous examinedin historical context. Dawkins’ arguments were defrocked. Good history of science, good history of religion are powerful weapons that empower students.
Darwinism, properly taught, preaches no religion. Nor does it preach for or against religion in general. History does show how politicians and philosophers have distorted Darwin for their own idealistic goals.
Want to make the battlefield of high school and college level and fair?
Get good history into public schools.
Professional Historians & Professional Geneticists and Professional Paleontologists Agree.
Put Intelligent Design in science classes? No. Put it in history classes. Put it in context — the inevitable historical reaction to atheist excess.
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