Title: Darwin and Fundamentalism
Author/Artist: Merryl Wyn Davies
Publisher: Icon Books
Media: Book
Reviewer: Paul Taylor
The dispute between creationists and evolutionists is profoundly important, and often complex. Part of the complexity lies in the subtle nature of some of the theoretical aspects of contemporary Darwinism, and part lies in the various levels of discourse, in the different agendas. I am not sure that these issues are left clearer than they were by this author's account.
Referring to the famous Scopes Monkey Trial, where the American Civil Liberties Union challenged a 1925 Tennessee statute banning the teaching of evolution in schools, Davies suggests that,
"The religious argument is not about assertions of science, in the narrow sense of whether they are accurate or inaccurate, but about the purposes and ends of such knowledge, how it is acquired and used." (p.40)This is misleading, since, even though issues about the social use of science arise in this context, the author herself writes, of so-called creation scientists, that,
"They utilize as much scientific observation, measurement and experiment as possible to pick holes in evolution and to support the old argument that complex design needs a designer - the designer being the Creator." (p.50)They do this to promote the claim that the whole universe is less than 10 000 years old, and that it was created in only 6 days. They do this despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary from diverse branches of scientific research. Daniel Dennett, in Darwin's Dangerous Idea, puts it like this:
"the evidence for evolution pours in, not only from geology, palaeontology, biogeography, and anatomy (Darwin's chief sources), but of course from molecular biology and every other branch of the life sciences. To put it bluntly but fairly, anyone today who doubts that the variety of life on this planet was produced by a process of evolution is simply ignorant - inexcusably ignorant, in a world where three out of four people have learned to read and write." (op. cit., p.46)Dennett acknowledges that one might accept evolution but doubt that natural selection was the mechanism underlying it, but the case for natural selection is hugely persuasive, since the theory has survived countless challenges, emerging, as he says, deeper and stronger with every test. Davies' way of putting this is that,
"In all the permutations of evidence brought forth and argued, natural selection is the credo determinedly clung to by all scientific opinion." (p.30)The reason Davies puts it that way emerges as she rehashes the familiar argument that disputes between evolutionary theorists such as Gould and Dawkins (author of The Selfish Gene) justify disbelief in the whole theory.
"Palaeontology requires that long-term evolutionary trends be explained as the distinctive success of some species versus others, and not as a gradual accumulation of adaptations generated by organisms within a continually evolving population. It also shows the effect of historic contingency, the importance of catastrophes and mass extinctions, that bears little relation to evolved adaptive reasons for success of lineages in normal Darwinian times." (p.63)The question of catastrophes and mass extinctions need not entail grave problems for natural selection, however, and Dennett puts this issue in a historical context:
"It is true that Darwin tended to insist, shortsightedly, on the gradual nature of all extinctions, but it has long been recognized by neo-Darwinians that this was due to his eagerness to distinguish his view from the varieties of Catastrophism that stood in the way of acceptance of the theory of evolution by natural selection." (op. cit., p.303)Of course, the emphasis of this series of books, Postmodern Encounters, is sociological rather than scientific, and Davies says of creationists that,
"they formulate their arguments in terms of the sociology of knowledge, which argues that all science is socially constructed, and that postmodern thought has doubt as an essential premise." (p.44)Note the contrived asymmetries here: Davies could (and should) have said that science has doubt as an essential premise, but attributes skepticism only to postmodern thought. She also fails to mention that religions are socially constructed, and thus misses an opportunity to explain what religious apologists make of that awkward circumstance.
Clearly much is at stake in the current battles over evolution: not least the integrity of education systems. But the author's efforts also to contrive symmetries between fundamentalisms in science and religon are less than convincing.
"Darwin and his theory of natural selection are much more than a specific scientific theory, they are icons of power and territory, cultural icons about the appropriate order and superiority of sources of explanatory power. That is why scientists find such useful and willing helpmates in creationists." (p.31)I don't think Ian Plimer would agree. When this Australian geologist dared to argue in court that a creationist was peddling misleading information, he ended up being the target of a hate campaign, with attempts to remove him from his professorship, and now lives at secret addresses after receiving death threats (New Scientist, 22 April 2000, p.43).
Davies is pleased to attribute "complexity and sophistication" (p.57) to Pope John Paul II's upgraded dogmas, but denies these qualities to neo-Darwinists like Dawkins, who, as is customary in these discussions, are misrepresented by remarks like this:
"In the various constructions of gene-centred thought, genes develop agency, more consciousness and purpose than the lumbering robots that bear them." (p.65)Davies says this after citing Dawkins, then, a few pages later, writes:
"Dawkins is explicit: we are lumbering robots, built body and mind by genes. 'DNA neither knows nor cares. DNA just is.' [Dawkins, River Out of Eden, p.166]" (p.68)How can Dawkins be endowing genes that neither know nor care with consciousness and purpose?
To sum up: the attempt to equate the rhetoric of some evolutionists with the morally and educationally pernicious antics of creationists seems perverse, and is symptomatic of the fashion for science-bashing in the current Science Wars.