Reflectorites
Bill Dembski has issued a partial retraction of his claim that Daniel
Dennett recommended quarantining parents who doubt Darwinism.
Personally I agree with someone on another List I am on who wrote
that "Dennett doth protest too much" and pointed out that:
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Bill Dembski is hardly alone in reading Daniel Dennett as advising the
"quarantine" of those who dissent from Darwinian naturalism. What
follows is a passage from Ron Numbers's _Darwinism Comes to America_
(Harvard University Press, 1998, p. 13). Note that Numbers understands
Dennett exactly as Bill did:
"If Dawkins played the role of point man for late-twentieth-century
naturalistic evolutionists, Daniel C. Dennett gladly served as their hatchet
man. In a book called _Darwin's Dangerous Idea_ (1995), which Dawkins
warmly endorsed, Dennett portrayed Darwinism as "a universal solvent,
capable of cutting right to the heart of everything in sight" -- and
particularly effective in dissolving religious beliefs. The most ardent
creationist could not have said it with more conviction, but Dennett's
agreement with them ended there. He despised creationists, arguing that
"there are no forces on this planet more dangerous to us all than the
fanaticisms of fundamentalism." Displaying a degree of intolerance more
characteristic of a fanatic Fundamentalist than an academic philosopher, he
called for "caging" those who would deliberately misinform children about
the natural world, just as one would cage a threatening wild animal. "The
message is clear," he wrote: "those who will not accomodate, who will not
temper, who insist on keeping only the purest and wildest strain of their
heritage alive, we will be obliged, reluctantly, to cage or disarm, and we
will do our best to disable the memes [traditions] they fight for." With the
bravado of a man unmindful that only 11 percent of the public shared his
enthusiasm for naturalistic evolution, he warned parents that if they insisted
on teaching their children "falsehoods -- that the Earth is flat, that 'Man' is
not a product of evolution by natural selection -- then you must expect, at
the very least, that those of us who have freedom of speech will feel free to
describe your teachings as the spreading of falsehoods, and will attempt to
demonstrate this to your children at our earliest opportunity." Those who
resisted conversion to Dennett's scientific fundamentalism would be subject
to "quarantine."
The person added:
Now, it is possible that Ron Numbers, too, has misread Dennett. I doubt it,
however. But make your own call; here is Dennett himself (emphasis in
original, p. 516):
"Save the Baptists! Yes, of course, but not *by all means*. Not if it means
tolerating the deliberate misinforming of children about the natural world.
According to a recent poll, 48 percent of the people of the United States
believe that the book of Genesis is literally true. And 70 percent believe
that 'creation science' should be taught in school alongside evolution. Some
recent writers recommend a policy in which parents would be able to 'opt
out' of materials they didn't want their children taught. Should evolution be
taught in the schools? Should arithmetic be taught? Should history?
Misinforming a child is a terrible offense. A faith, like a species, must
evolve or go extinct when the environment changes. It is not a gentle
process in either case."
and the person concluded:
"Not a gentle process" doesn't put one in mind of dispassionate education.
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I would add that I am a Baptist and when I read this in Dennett I took it
as a very real threat that should Dennett's crowd ever gain executive power
they would carry out their threat to separate my children from my wife and
I so that we could not pass on to them the Bible's teaching.
Steve
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http://listserv.omni-list.com/scripts/wa.exe?A2=ind00&L=metaviews&D=1&O=D&F=&S=&P=3794
[...]
Finally, William Dembski also writes with a partial retraction of a
statement made about Daniel Dennett's reputed desire to "quarantine"
parents who doubt Darwinism.
[...]
From: "William A. Dembski" <William_Dembski@baylor.edu>
Subject: Clarification to "Disbelieving Darwin and Feeling No Shame"
I'd like to post a clarification to my essay "Disbelieving Darwin and
Feeling No Shame":
In my essay "Disbelieving Darwin and Feeling No Shame" I made the
following statement: "Daniel Dennett even recommends 'quarantining'
parents who teach their children to doubt Darwinism (see the end of
his *Darwin's Dangerous Idea*)." This is not quite accurate. On p.
519 of his book, Dennett states, "Those whose visions dictate that
they cannot peacefully coexist with the rest of us we will have to
quarantine as best we can...." A few lines later he continues, "If
you insist on teaching your children falsehoods--that the Earth is
flat, that "Man" is not a product of evolution by natural
selection--then you must expect, at the very least, that those of us
who have freedom of speech will feel free to describe your teachings
as the spreading of falsehoods, and will attempt to demonstrate this
to your children at our earliest opportunity. Our future
well-being--the well-being of all of us on the planet--depends on the
education of our descendants."
As Dennett in a private communication has made clear to me, he does
not recommend quarantining parents who teach their children to doubt
Darwin's theory and takes exception to anyone who attributes as much
to him. I agree that there is no explicit recommendation here to
quarantine parents who teach their children to doubt Darwinism.
Nonetheless, it seems to me that there is an implicit recommendation
to do just that. If (1) doubting Darwinian evolution is as silly as
believing in a flat earth and (2) if our future well-being depends on
the [proper] education of our descendants and (3) if "at the very
least" Darwinists will attempt to demonstrate the truth of Darwinism
to our children at their "earliest opportunity" and (4) if
"quarantining" is maintained as a live option by Darwinists, then it
is no big stretch to think that quarantining parents who teach their
children to doubt Darwin is far from Dennett's intention.
Sincerely,Bill
--William A. Dembski, Ph.D.Director, Michael Polanyi Center
Associate Research Professor in the Conceptual Foundations of Science
Baylor University
Address: William A. Dembski The Michael Polanyi Center
P.O. Box 97130 Baylor University
Waco, TX 76798-7130
E-mail: William_Dembski@baylor.edu
Web: www.baylor.edu/~William_Dembski (personal)
www.baylor.edu/~polanyi (Michael Polanyi Center)
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"Today, however, the picture is entirely different. More and more workers
are showing signs of dissatisfaction with the synthetic theory. Some are
attacking its philosophical foundations, arguing that the reason that it has
been so amply confirmed is simply that it is unfalsifiable: with a little
ingenuity any observation can be made to appear consistent with it. Others
have been deliberately setting out to work in just those areas in which neo-
Darwinism is least comfortable, like the problem of the gaps in the fossil
record or the mechanisms of non-Mendelian inheritance. Still others,
notably some systematists, have decided to ignore the theory altogether,
and to carry on their research without any a priori assumption about how
evolution has occurred. Perhaps most significantly of all, there is now
appearing a stream of articles and books defending the synthetic theory. It
is not so long ago that hardly anyone thought this was necessary."
(Ho M-W. & Saunders P.T., eds., "Beyond Neo-Darwinism: An Introduction
to the New Evolutionary Paradigm," Academic Press: London, 1984,
p.ix)
Stephen E. Jones | sejones@iinet.net.au | http://www.iinet.net.au/~sejones
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