Uvitenskapelig

Den katolske evolusjonsbiologen Ken Miller anmelder Mooney og Kirshenbaums Unscientific America.

Scientific literacy would seem to be essential for the health of the American research community, but if that's the case, we may be in for some rough times ahead.

Taking astronomer Carl Sagan as a model for advancing the public understanding of science, Mooney and Kirshenbaum recount the heady days of Cosmos, Sagan's remarkable documentary that heightened interest in astronomy, space travel, and science itself.

Since then, by their account, scientists as a class have been less effective in communicating the promise and power and beauty of their work to the American public. In an age when traditional media like newspapers and television have been shedding their science journalists, there can be little doubt that their core thesis is spot on.

As they note, to make matters even worse, the scientific community itself harbors ingrained prejudices and resentments against those whom, like Sagan or Stephen Jay Gould, some regard as mere "popularizers" of the discipline.

Selv om blader som Illustrert Vitenskap viser at populærvitenskap er ahem... populært, er det ikke helt underlig om fagmiljøers reaksjoner kan være noe blandet. Heldigvis er inntrykket på det hjemlige berget ikke at man dermed har klart å dempe vitenskapsinteressen.

Selv om den selvsagt burde vært enda større.

Noe mer kontroversielt er det når boka drister seg til å hevde som enkelte andre av oss at nye ateister med deres uforsonlige og stemplende angrep på religion og gudstro mer skader enn fremmer vitenskapssaken.

Noe som altså ikke direkte har gjort PZ Myers mindre stemplende og uforsonlig.

Mooney and Kirshenbaum devote 12 pages (Chapter 8: "Bruising their Religion") to considering the effects of attacks on religion done in the name of science. As they point out, scientists like Richard Dawkins, philosophers like Daniel Dennett, and science bloggers such as PZ Myers of the University of Minnesota at Morris often argue that science is frankly contradictory to religious faith.

That's a serious point of view that is worth discussion, and I've participated in such discussions myself in several venues and media. But, as Mooney and Kirshenbaum describe, in some cases, Myers and friends have advanced their arguments in ways that don't so much challenge believers as belittle and insult them.

As a case in point, they describe an episode last year in which Myers obtained a consecrated communion host from a Catholic mass and then polled his readers on the best way to desecrate it. Not surprisingly, Myers' stunt outraged some Catholics - exactly as the blogger had hoped. The authors of Unscientific America report on all of this.

As a result, Myers and his supporters have reacted to these 12 pages of Unscientific America with extraordinary levels of outrage (see, for example, Myers' final response to the book). Having read much of their criticism, I reread the book and the offending chapter to search for slander and personal attacks that could merit such outrage. But I couldn't find them.

In fact, I couldn't find anything personal about Myers, Dawkins, or any of the other so-called "new atheists." Instead, Mooney and Kirshenbaum make the rather unremarkable point that Myers' actions in desecrating that communion host were "incredibly destructive and unnecessary."

They further observe that such events set "the cause backward by exacerbating tensions between the scientific community and many American Christians." This assessment seems to me to be exactly right.

Dette bør ikke tolkes dit hen at Myers og co bør avholde seg fra å kritisere religion. Men så lenge man skaper inntrykket av at seriøs kunnskap om vitenskap automatisk tar knekken på religion og at religiøse som ønsker å forsette i sine illusjoner ikke bør bry seg om vitenskap - er det vanskelig å se dette som fryktelig stimulerende på interessen.

Spesielt ikke når så mange av påstandene om gudstro og gudstroende er så fulle av uvitenskapelige uttalelser.

Hvis nye ateister virkelig trodde at vitenskapen hadde denne effekten, i seg selv, uten ateistiske tolkningsnøkler med på lasset, ville det avgjort vært et smartere trekk bare å fremme mer engasjement og kunnskap.

Uten så mye styr og stempling.