Freedom of Religion is its Own Enemy

Posted on 06/01/2005 9:24:53 AM PDT by Fester Chugabrew (here)

It's a common claim of libertarians, liberals, atheists and skeptics that religious conservatives use the public schools to promote creationism. I believe that claim is incorrect. The truth is that libertarians, liberals, atheists and skeptics use the public schools to promote atheism. Public schools are bad of course, and all schools should be private. But if there are going to be public schools anyway, they should be for all people, for evolutionists and creationists, for atheists and theists. Public schools should teach both evolution and creationism, and students should be given the choice which of those courses they want to take. It's the libertarians, liberals, atheists and skeptics that want to take away people's free choice, in the name of religious freedom, so as to make sure that everybody is forced to learn scientific truth and nobody gets exposed to pseudo-scientific heresy. That idea is based on a mistaken view of what separation between Church and State means.

Separation between Church and State means, or at least should mean, that government will not takes sides promoting one religion over the other. Or religion over nonreligion. Or nonreligion over religion. Forbidding creationism in public schools is itself an attack on the separation between Church and State. It means the State promotes education the way atheists want it and hampers education the way theists want it. My opponents will counter that public schools do not promote atheism. They're supposedly neutral and teach only science, while they teach neither atheism nor theism. Nonsense. What a school teaches is never neutral and can never be neutral. Every choice a school makes on what courses to give and how is a value judgment on what is good. Therefore, the conflicts public schools create about what to teach can never be solved. They're inherent in the very idea of a public school and can only be solved by privatizing all public schools. The best public schools can do for now is cater to as many needs as possible, especially needs carried by large proportions of students. Not doing that, for example by teaching evolution and not creationism, is not a neutral choice.

If one interprets the Separation between Church and State more strictly, so as to mean government must not even have any indirect connection to religion, then one might indeed argue that public schools should not teach creationism. (One might then even be able to argue that people on welfare should be forbidden to spend their welfare money on religious goods or services.) But such a strict interpretation would be unfair as long as there is no Separation between School and State. For if there is this kind of a separation between Church and State, while there is no general separation between School and State, religious education is put at a severe disadvantage to any kind of other education. Why should all schools of thought about what kind of education is appropriate get a say in the public school system, except if there is a religious connection? Separation between School and State is a great idea, which would depoliticize education, via privatization. But a very strictly interpreted separation between Church and State is simply not possible or desirable, as long as government controls public schools. If they control public schools they should try to cater equally to all education needs and education philosophies, whether they be scientific, atheist, religious, or whatever.

In this regard it's the religious right that stands on the side of freedom of religion and free scientific inquiry. They fully respect the rights of atheists to teach evolution in public schools, even though they think it incorrect. Their opponents, on the other hand, do no respect the rights of theist to teach creationism in public schools, because they think it incorrect. It may be that strictly speaking evolution is not atheism while creationism is theism. That doesn't remove the unfairness of the public schools in that they do teach what many atheist want taught (evolution) while they do not teach what many theist want taught (creationism). One might argue that the principle involved is that public schools should teach science and that therefore evolution is an appropriate subject to teach while creationism is not. There are two problems with that view:

1. Many creationists believe creationism is scientific.
2. It's not true that public schools only teach science.

As to 1, I agree that creationism is bad science, or nonscience, while evolution is good science. But it's not appropriate for government to make judgments about what is science or not science. For government to do that is a violation of well established principles of free scientific inquiry. The fact that evolution is true and creationism is false is besides the point. Government shouldn't decide what scientific truth is and tell people what to do or learn based on that judgment. Using government power against religious scientism is just as bad as when the Church used force against Galileo's secular science, and this is so for the same reasons. Therefore, the most neutral position to take is that everything should be taught in public schools if there is a big enough demand for it being taught.

As to 2. Most people think public schools should teach certain things other than science, such as physical education, moral education, sexual conduct, political ideas, social skills. Therefore one may not disallow the teaching of creationism on the grounds that it's not science, even putting aside the fact that not everybody agrees creationism isn't science. The same argument would disallow many things that are currently being taught in public schools. If we single out religion as something nonscientific that cannot be taught, while say political correctness can be taught, then we are using the first amendment in a way opposite to how it was intended. Instead of protecting religion now it's being used as a bias against religion.

Creationism is just one of many subjects that could be taught by public schools. And if that's what many people want taught, it should be taught, at least as an optional subject. Allowing creationism taught does not require any law which would respect an establishment of religion nor does it prohibit the free exercise of religion, and so there's no first amendment conflict. Quite the opposite. Taxing people to pay for public schools, and then forbidding them to teach religion, limits people's funds and options for exercising religion. Precisely a law forbidding creationism in public schools prohibits to some extent, or at least hampers, the free exercise of religion.

Let me be clear that I don't think it's good that schools teach creationism, intelligent design, or other pseudoscience such as astrology, witchcraft, ESP, etc. If I were to create or fund or support a school, I would argue against it doing those things. So it's not that I think it's appropriate for schools to teach falsehoods and pseudoscience. My point is that it is not for me to judge what is appropriate or not for other people. When I own my own private school, it's my own business to make those judgments. But when it's a public school, the school should serve the purposes of everybody. Not only should it serve the purposes of both those in favour of pseudoscience and those in favour of science. But, more importantly, it should recognize that not everybody will agree on what is science and what is pseudoscience. In a free society everybody is allowed to make his own judgment on that. For government to make that judgment for people is authoritarian. Therefore, governments should not forbid subjects being taught based on the fact that they are pseudoscience. If you give government the power to forbid something because it's pseudoscience, then they are bound also to forbid something genuinely scientific and true at some point, on the argument that it is pseudoscience. We are all fallible, and so is the government. Power given to government to protect us against illness, unhappiness and bad ideas, even with the best of intentions, will eventually turn against us and control us.

The state is used to supply education the way atheists want it, while it cannot be used to supply education the way theists want it, but they do pay part of the taxes. The reason this is done is not because atheists value religious freedom. I'm not saying atheists don't value religious freedom. I assume they do, I'm saying that's not the reason they control the public schools in this manner. Atheists do this for the same reason that in Islamic states all education is religious. They do it because they want to force people to live wholesome lives and do and learn what is good for them. Science is good, religion is bad, ergo people must learn science and the teaching of religion must be made difficult. Every group uses state power to enforce their way of life on others. This will be so as long as there is a state. Only the theists are more honest about it. These conflicts can never be solved except by privatization of schools. But as long as there are public schools any special restrictions on any kind of teaching, whether such teachings are defended on religious, scientific, cultural or moral grounds, is inappropriate and in conflict with the spirit of the first amendment. I'm an atheist, by the way.

[This is one of those rare articles that really does a wonderful job of nailing a topic down and stating the facts clearly.]

R.E.S.P.E.C.T

" On the contrary: to believe something in the face of evidence and against reason - to believe something by faith - is ignoble, irresponsible and ignorant, and merits the opposite of respect. It is time to say so.” - A C Grayling (get whole article here)

I will disagree with someone calling me ‘ignoble’ for having faith in something outside the realm of what is classified as ‘science’. Now I’ve read those immortal classics “The Naked Ape” and “The Web of Belief” and my college career was highlighted with not one, but three courses in philosophy which (due to the same professor) all touched on the arguments of Religion and Science.

I have spent a great amount of personal time on the question of what I ‘believe’ and I’ve approached a viable solution to this problem. Do not argue one against the other. I believe as I do in something that is quite ‘superstitious’ and ‘superfluous’ in a vacuum of science. My ‘faith’ so happens to be the very challenge to which I must test myself in belief. Don’t take science on faith and don't prove my religious belief scientifically.

Believe it or not Science and Religion are mutually exclusive so you immediately forfeit any argument in which you try to justify one with the other. You can not disprove religion with science. Religion is not found in any book, a basis for religion perhaps, but not what makes spirituality. I do not ‘believe’ in science, rather I understand things that are proven scientifically to be a perfectly sensible means of navigating my life.

That being said… I would argue that science disproves science. It does so every second of every day. I believe that the basic laws, principles, and periodic tables provide solid foundations with which to discover the world about us, but the body of science is fluid.

Some would argue every religion is also as fluid. This is true.

Truth? Science holds truth in a cause/effect relationship. Something is not true until it’s been declared, tested, and proven scientifically… with all due process. How weak of a concept is that? Your truth is measured by the strength of your ability to test, which relies on the ability to accurately measure response.

Science is a great tool, and it has provided us the means to live as we do. However, science has shown us an atom’s mass of what there is to know. To take this pea’s worth of knowledge and hurl it at anyone as the ‘whole’ truth is reckless. Even the most learned scientist only knows a fraction of what there is to know. Religion accounts to me things that science can not answer.

To hang on the arguments of those that disprove religion with treatises about creationism vs. evolution and historical studies that prove this thing or that thing about people in the bible is to embrace logic in an effort to prove that which is not logical. Is it always logical to love someone? I’d argue when it defies all reason you still will find love. Is it logical to feel happy or sad? Sometimes there are reasons that can be biologically explained and sometimes there are not. Religion is not a logical endeavor.

Everything in our world is fluid. Yet, we have the rock of our mind to cling to. I’ve read many articles on the nature of what we perceive and how it is that perception that marks what is real and what is not. Science is built on that perception recorded over time, analyzed and discussed in mass.

Perception is why such debate will rage on. I will not convince you to be Christian any more than you’ll convince me to not be until one of us makes up our mind to accept change. What is real and what is not changes with our perception.

In summary, I could write three books on the subject and still not find anything more convincing to say, in that I’d actually convince you, my reader. I will however state things as I can best with my given mind and pool of understanding and ask that you comment from out yours. In this ‘conversation’ mayhap there will be the changing of minds and that is our common goal.

I will do my best to be brief and end all posts with a question. It is your words and opinions that I cherish, not my own (which are abundant and close at hand).

Herein lay a mystery: Why do we change our minds?