Evolutionary science isn't a closed book

This is nowhere more obvious than in the mighty suppression of evidence in the textbook rendition of human origins. In Darwin's day as well as our own, the naturalistic account means that our behaviour is in many ways heritable and accordingly cannot be shaped indefinitely by culture. We are not blank slates upon which social norms can be written at will. To some it's doubtful that we even have free will.

This view is offensive to prevailing opinion and, in the case of race and sex, can stir explosive emotions. Managing this high-risk area is a delicate exercise requiring that students be shielded from contemporary genetic evidence of ethnic affinity, racial differences and innate sexual differences, while extolling the power of science to identify and treat heritable diseases.

Darwin, too, must be rescued from the taint of evolution's deplorable racist, sexist and eugenic past. This is a neat trick because Darwin shared the Victorian view that arranged races on a scale of evolutionary advance, with caucasians at the peak, and he did not doubt that many so-called inferior races would be extinguished in the struggle for existence. His vision of man through the scientific lens confirmed the Victorian self-evidence that women were the weaker sex.

As for eugenics, Darwin worried a great deal about congenital illness that he passed to his offspring and he was favourably disposed to the eugenic aspiration invented by his first cousin Francis Galton.

How do textbooks cope with this great jeopardy? Mainly by pretending that it doesn't exist. Students are told, for example, that biologists overwhelmingly endorse natural selection as the main mechanism of evolution, as they do. But there is usually no hint at the vigorous debates among them about its interpretation and evidence. Similarly with the cardinal sins of racism, sexism and eugenics. It is enough merely to express strong disapproval in the name of the latest scientific evidence and pass in silence the active debate on racial and sexual differences in IQ.

In the light of these considerations, what are we to make of the proposal to teach the controversy? As a teacher who attempts to encourage student engagement and critical thinking, I was cautiously favourable. Many prominent biologists ignore the supposedly sacred boundary between empirical science and speculation to talk about the still unknown origin of life and the meaning of evolution in the cosmic context. This includes evolutionists who say bluntly that evolution has no human meaning. If such speculations were introduced into biology courses, the inclusion of ID would be natural. This I have done in tertiary-level history of science with reasonably good results. But at secondary-level biology? I don't think so. However, the APLS round table may see other possibilities.