Silence Is Never Neutral; Neither is Science or Science Teaching

This is the title of an opinion piece published on Scientific American. The article is an opinion piece by members of the the 500 Women Scientists Leadership. SA has kept the name of the authors private to protect them from repercussions from writing an anti-racism piece.

Science teaching is not neutral, either. Although the piece that follows is not about racism in teaching, it raises the questions about how teachers deal with objectivity and subjectivity in science teaching. I’ve republished it today, June 8, 2020. It was originally published in 2014.

In teaching, should we try to be objective?

If you are a teacher, or if you have taught school, you most likely dealt with  this question at one time or another.  As you will see, it’s not as easy to answer as we might think.

It’s Not Settled

Today, there are groups who are calling for objectivity in the teaching of certain ideas, especially in science courses.  They claim that it is only fair to all students to teach theories such as evolution, cosmology, origins, and with objectivity.  In fact, some states have passed laws that require biological and chemical evolution theories to be analyzed and discussed critically.  In these cases, the tactic is to raise doubts about theories related to evolution, and suggest that not only is the “science not settled” (these proponents love this phrase), but that there are competing theories that ought be included in the science curriculum.  What are the competing theories?  Well, how about intelligent design, or creation science.

Controversial Ideas

Another word that crops up here is the idea of controversial theories or ideas.  For science educators, controversial ideas include the teaching of evolution, discussions of birth control, theories of the origins of the universe, such as the Big Bang, global warming and climate change.  School boards, parents, and politicians have gotten involved in trying to pass rules restricting what and how “controversial” topics are taught, and have lately used the pedagogy of “critical thinking” to make sure that “all” sides of each controversial topic are discussed.  Although the teaching of evolution, or I should say creation science/intelligent design was settled by Federal Judge John Jones in the famous Dover, Pennsylvania case when the judge ruled that intelligent design was not science, and had no place in a science class.

In my view, cases like the Dover intelligent design issue, the Kansas science standards controversy, attempts by legislators and state school boards in Georgia, Florida, Texas, Louisiana, Missouri, Oklahoma, and Tennessee to legislate the content of the science curriculum to satisfy their own (often religious beliefs) opinions is an assault on the integrity of the teaching profession to make professional decisions on curriculum and pedagogy.

Objectivity in Teaching

But there is another idea that teachers have to deal with, and that is the idea of objectivity in teaching.  The phrase “try to be objective” is not new.  Objectivity in teaching, especially when considered along with subjectivity in teaching is not a simple matter of leaving your emotions at the door.  Teachers are not robots, nor are their students.  They are humans with a full range of emotions, conniption, beliefs, attitudes, and goals.  If teachers are facilitators of student learning, then these attributes ought be part of the process of teaching and learning.

Objectivity in teaching is being used by some groups to affect the way science is taught in public schools.  Very much like the pedagogies of “critical thinking” and “controversial topics,” objectivity is being used to manage the way any idea that has a religious connotation is presented to students.  The rule of thumb is that student should be “objectively informed” about theories and ideas that might impact student’s religious beliefs.

One group’s mission, Citizens for Objective Public Education, “is to promote objectivity in public school curricula that address religious questions and issues so that the educational effect of the teaching is religiously neutral.” (Citizens for Objective Education, c. 2012)

Another group promoting objectivity defines objectivity as resulting from the scientific method without philosophic or religious assumptions, when questions like, Where do we come from? are asked (Intelligent Design Network (IDN)).   This group believes that intelligent design is one of those ideas that competes scientifically with the theory of natural selection and biological evolution.  This organization believes that ID is inherently objective and neutral.  Most in the science education community would disagree.

If you check the websites of these organizations, and court documents which one group filed the claim is made that science is an orthodoxy which is used to indoctrinate the minds of students.  According to COPE and IDN, science promotes a materialistic/atheistic Worldview and not an “objective and religiously neutral origins of life education.”

So now, science educators need to push back against groups calling for objective and neutral teaching of evolution, and related concepts.

Should we try to be objective (fair, balanced) in teaching?  Yes, if we think that teaching should be analytic, antiseptic, cold, detached, disinterested, emotionless, impersonal, and unemotional, just to mention a few.  No, if we think teaching should be characterized as abstract, idiosyncratic, instinctive, intuitive, personal, introspective, inventive, rational, thoughtful, just to mention a few.

Nel Noddings talks about the notion of trying to be objective in education.  She says:

Probably you, like all people who have undergone higher education in Western institutions, have been encouraged throughout your school career to “try to be objective.” With this exhortation, your teachers have been urging you to put aside your personal opinions and prejudices—to avoid “subjectivity”—and give an account backed by impartial evidence. Not only do postmodernists deny that this can be done, but they also claim that the very attempt to do so has already biased any investigation. An investigation or argument so launched is riddled with the assumptions of standard modernist thought.  Noddings, Nel (2011-07-26). Philosophy of Education (pp. 78-79). Westview Press. Kindle Edition.

Trying to be objective in teaching flies in the face not only of science, but what we know about learning.  COPE and IDN want to control the classroom and the teaching of science by imposing their beliefs and religious assumptions in the public sphere.  Their notion of objectivity is a narrow definition.   Nodding talks here about how our views of science and education are changing:

As in epistemology, there is a current trend away from the notion of science as normatively controlled and objective. Many philosophers now construe science as a social practice, one influenced by group biases as well as individual ones. In social science, the biases of both the scientist and the scientific community are further aggravated by the fact that its objects of research are themselves subjects replete with their own biases and idiosyncratic responses.  Noddings, Nel (2011-07-26). Philosophy of Education (p. 219). Westview Press. Kindle Edition.

The teaching of origins and evolution in public schools has been a curriculum issue in American schools.  John Scopes violated a rule that made it unlawful to teach human evolution in a state funded school (Scopes Trial, 1925).   From the 1960 forward, the fundamentalist Christian effort masked as a science (creation science) resulted in the publishing of curriculum and textbooks that focused on concepts from Biblical Genesis.  In 1989, the notion of Intelligent Design appeared a biology book entitled of Pandas and People.  From that point on, there has been a continuing effort, primarily through the efforts of the Discovery Institute, an Intelligent Design (non scientific) organization.  Now we add the notion of objectivity in teaching as a way to restrict the science curriculum.  These curriculum issues are still part of American science education.