Cheap Labour in the Pipeline
I’ve run businesses and been a consultant to them for many years. Successful enterprises rely on well educated staff. It doesn’t matter if an individual has a degree in science or arts, if they’ve applied themselves and can think they’re going to be an asset.
As soon as you prevent students from being able to distinguish between faith and science, between thinking and hoping, you supply the workplaces of America with substantially below par workers.
The undermining of science caused by the fundamentalist IDers does just this. Soon Louisiana will be sending out of it’s colleges young people who I can’t employ for anything other than manual labour or low skill jobs - such as filing.
I hope that science teachers will use the Louisiana Science Education Act to introduce their students to Dawkins, Dennett, Hitchens and Harris. Teaching the real controversy - that between science and religion - is a useful way to get students to think about thinking, to develop a critical approach to materials.
In every conversation I’ve had with people who have supported Intelligent design every one of them has ended up admitting that it’s not science and come away from the conversation converted.
I often use the phrase “hoist with their own petard” meaning that the weapon an individual uses ends up damaging them. I think that, if they’re supported, science teachers all over America can use this bill and others that are similar, to introduce a strong defense of science, to turn the sloppily drafted bills against their creators and end up with a better educated population.
For a fuller report of the situation I can recommend New Scientists coverage.
Tags: Curriculum Development, Dawkins, Education, Teacher