In a recent piece titled "The Scientific Method: An Educational Train Wreck?" Dr. Larry Dossey made a number of statements so factually inaccurate, so misrepresentative of the nature of science, that it reads like some ill-conceived parody gone awry, something meant for The Onion rather than The Huffington Post.
The rot begins with his first sentence. Dossey accuses scheming educators of trying "to inculcate children with the scientific method." As someone who has taught college-level earth sciences for over a decade, I plead guilty. There is great value in "inculcating"--or "teaching," to use the technical term--students about scientific methodology and nature of science, and there are wonderful websites, such as undsci.berkeley.edu, to help students understand these important topics.
What does Dossey have against teaching students about the methodology of science? "The way science is currently defined and taught," he contends, "is a profound violation of how today's youngsters ... see the world." So what?
Students come to the classroom with a host of misconceptions about the world. If you ask first-year college students a few basic questions about the natural world, you will quickly discover pervasive ignorance. What causes the seasons? Most students think summer is caused by the Earth being closer to the Sun. Why is the sky blue? A very small percentage of students can answer in terms of wavelengths of light. Which falls faster, a heavy weight or a light weight? Most think the heavier object falls faster.
It is the proper job of science educators to help these student see the world as it really is, rather than to reinforce their prejudices. Biology students should learn that the theory of evolution is correct and that vaccines do not cause autism; astronomy students should learn the world will not end in 2012; chemistry students should understand why homeopathic claims about "water memory" are not true. Science education can--and should--help students understand reality.
Yet Dossey believes "the way kids are taught science these days constitutes a form of child abuse." He compares forcing children to learn scientific methodology to an "infliction of a false identity," and compares this to Native American children in white-run schools being forced to give up their culture.
Nothing could be further from the truth. As Carl Sagan memorably argued in his essay "The Wind Makes Dust," science in an inherently human endeavor, part of all cultures. Hunter-gatherers relied on deep knowledge about the natural world; in order to hunt, they had to recognize, from careful study and experience, the tracks of certain animals, and to judge how much time had passed since those tracks were made. A scientific understanding of the world brings food to the table--especially if you have to hunt that food.
And it's not just hunter-gatherers who benefit from scientific methodology. Although Dossey thinks the scientific method is the "main legacy of traditional science," I can point to another legacy: the millions upon millions of people alive right now because of medical advances made possible through scientific discoveries. From vaccines to anesthesia, science has reduced human suffering and needless deaths, and produced longer and better lives. It is hard to imagine why anyone would be against such a legacy.
Dossey posits that one reason "many young people see themselves as foreigners in the world of science" is the "separateness, distance, and aloofness required to do science." What in the world is he talking about?
The misconception of scientists as cold, remote individuals comes from movies and television, not reality. The scientists I know have the same personality quirks as people in any other profession.The unemotional Spock was the Enterprise's chief science officer, but science fiction is a poor basis for characterizing all scientists. This is like concluding that all doctors are wise-cracking cynics, on the basis of watching an episode of House.
Dossey goes on to challenge the "image of science as an individual, solitary endeavor," claiming the "science community seems to go out of its way to conceal the collaborative, cooperative, team approach." Indeed, he claims that science is skewed toward the individual because the Nobel Prize is not awarded to teams. This might come as a surprise to the Intergovernmental Panel for Climate Change team, which in 2007 won the Nobel Prize.
Some scientific discoveries are made by solitary individuals, and some are made by teams. Generalizing about this is almost meaningless. It is hard to picture why this would, in any event, be a problem for science education, since some science students will be drawn toward solitary work, others toward collaborative efforts. There is a place for everyone in science.
Dossey concludes his essay by deploring the underrepresentation of women in the sciences. In my discipline--geology--there are roughly equal numbers of men and women, so this stereotype of science as a male-only domain is not universally true. It is correct, and unfortunate, that women are underrepresented in the sciences overall, but this can hardly be laid at the door of science--women are underrepresented in the financial sector and the military and politics, too. More to the point, though, gender equality has nothing to do with the validity of scientific methodology or the importance of having students learn about the natural world.
Dossey's essay misrepresents science, scientists, educators, and students. It is Dossey, not science, who has jumped the rails.
Side note... is there a reason HuffPo doesn't have a "science" section? Very right like no?
They seem to stick most science stories under "Tech" like astronomy and NASA related news... or "Green" if environment related... or "Life" if medical related (but have it right along with the medical pseudoscience junk as if to say its on par and legit...) There are a lot more interesting science news stories the fall outside those three areas HP!. Stop dropping the ball! I mean you have a "Religion" section for cry out loud!
The sad anti-science rants on HuffPo tend to be written by people who, if you believe the CV they claim, ought to know better but whose main purpose is to sell their point of view and, with some luck, sell a product or two at high cost.
As for Illstura Media and Discovery Institute I'll simply say that while they are selling a point of view which not even those who contributed to the Hebrew and Christian Bibles shared (that every word is literally true in the historical and every other sense). It's a disease called "God In A Box" and it's a wonderful marketing technique as much as it's pure crap.
HuffPo seems more interested in checkout stand "journalism" in these things just to get eyeballs on the ads here. Accuracy and honesty be damned.
I missed this one, but caught a link to it from former Huffington Post blogger Phil Plait.
http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2010/04/28/defending-science-on-huffpo/
I hope to be reading much more from you.
Thanks so much for making my day!
BTW - I posted this exact same comment, yesterday ... and it was deleted ... usually that only happens to my comments on Chopra, Lanza and Dossey type threads ........ amazing!
btw, i don't know what to say about the deleted comment... i don't have control over that.
Step one –think of some things that people generally feel bad about.
Step two – think of a way to draw comparisons to those things with science.
Step three – think of some things that people generally feel good about.
Step four – say science feels apathetic or hostile toward those things.
Step five – create a list of sciencey-sounding words and liberally pepper document with them.
Step six – think of a concise, declarative thesis for your article. Ignore it completely.
Step seven – with as little subtlety as possible, suggest that surrendering to supernatural belief is the only viable path to enlightenment.
Step eight – submit to Huff Post, because they don’t have a science section and will publish it in Living.
Great article, Steven. You missed seven out of eight.
did more than anyone to establish the ethos of there being a method, but he never did it
because it can't be done.
There is a lot of debate in the history and philosophy of science about all sorts of detail but with the exception of a few outliers such as Paul Feyerabend ("Against Method") the vast majority of historians, philosophers, and scientists are pretty clear on the fact that science does indeed proceed in a distinctive way that has been uniquely important in discovering actionable truths about the world.
There are big problems with the standard, high-school description of a scientific method--observe, make hypothesis, test, alter hypothesis if needed. Real scientists know that is rarely how things proceed; for example, the first step these days is usually to write a grant proposal. ;) But the fact that inadequate high-school textbooks present poor descriptions of science does not, in any way, change the nature of science itself.
Better, much more detailed descriptions of scientific methodologies can be found at undsci.berkeley.edu.
11:00 PM CST
A voice of reason. A breathe of fresh air. Hope this gets to be a habit at Huff.
I note also the Hawking/Sagan interviews article are generating a lot of interest.
Meanwhile, you are helping to generate a long awaited and badly needed wake-up call.
Thank you.
J.B.
4/26/10
I'm a lifelong lover of science, though not a lettered scientist myself. It's never failed to inspire my imagination and awe. And far from Dossey's allegation, it does foster compassion, creativity, and equality.
To equate science education with child abuse is an egregious fallacy. I'd say the greater abuse is to extinguish a child's natural curiosity about the world by failing to provide them adequate science literacy.
And yet, intelligent design advocate Ben Stein believes, "Science leads to killing people." This kind of nonsense is another good reason we need more science in the media. I rather like the idea of HuffPo Science section. :)