Would you have teachers mention flat-earth theory, phlogiston, star-sign astrology, pyramid energy, UFOs, Nostradamus, homeopathy and bigfoot?
There’s enough to teach about reality without confusing students and wasting time on nonsense.
4 Likes
Well, there’s no need to discuss everything.
High-profile things are good for schools, more specific examples for colleges/universities.
My undergrad research methods classes assessed in a good amount of depth specific examples like Thought Field Therapy, among a number of other examples as a means to exercise what we were learning. It was an incredibly useful way to teach on the distinction between science and pseudoscience, and emphasise what good research looks like.
Our lecturers were also very charitable to the people involved in these controversies, showing that you don’t need to rubbish the people behind these things to champion the cause of good science.
Put that in a philosophy class, rather than in a science class.
1 Like
You don’t think the relationship of a specific field to other fields is something worth at least touching on in that class?
Students training to be scientists will pick that up via informal communications and discussions. They don’t need to spend class time on it.
1 Like
But this is how we get scientists that are bad when it comes to the philosophy, history or theology of science 
The problem here is that these fields are relevant to theirs. I’m not suggesting an elaborate revision to the curricula, as much as suggesting that the curricula should signpost towards the intersections of these fields.
Well, yes, there is some bad philosophy of science coming from scientists. But the philosophy of science coming from professional philosophers is often far worse.
3 Likes
I am with you on this. If you have a high school student prepping for the science APs, they already have one full plate. It is just a practical matter that diversions could cost them a pass.
But electives - especially those locally developed by teachers with a passion for the subject - those can be great for students who self select into them. My daughter took such high school classes on genocide, and health science, which were formative for her. So as an elective, certainly. So much of interest…so little time.
1 Like
Fortunately they don’t need to be good at the philosophy, history, or theology of science, in order to be good scientists.
4 Likes
Heaven knows how many could not even communicate in a written language without a good editor and designated junior in the lab.
Except:
- Fewer and fewer students even take any philosophy courses
- It’s often the very insular and inward focus of science that tend to make students see science as irrelevant. Even science majors often see other sciences as irrelevant. Students, in general, have a hard time seeing how science connects to anything else in “real life”.
Except they most often don’t, and especially first-generation, disadvantaged, and minority students who generally struggle understand the “shadow culture” of college life.
2 Likes
The bigger issue may be that degree programs generally have arts requirements for science majors, but rarely do I see any reciprocal science requirements for arts and studies majors.
1 Like
During my undergrad geology studies (a long time ago) at the Free University of Amsterdam (a Reformed institution), we followed a mandatory philosophy class. It covered the basics of some of the major historical schools of thought on ontology and epistemology. There was no direct link to the science we were learning at the same time, but it did give some useful background context about the scientific endeavour as a whole. I thought it was time well spent.
My courses never discussed modern Creationism, let alone YEC, neither in the geology courses nor in this philosophy course. I guess at that time and place this was considered to be no more relevant than discussing Flat Earth theories. And this was at a Protestant Uni!
Occasionally there was some discussion about the relation between science and the Bible, in particular one geology professor had clearly thought about such things quite a lot. He seemed to be something of a fan of Teilhard the Chardin. Such ideas never got more than an occasional outing, though.
2 Likes
That can be an issue. At my institution we had a general education “refresh” and the result was moving from B.A. degrees requiring both a physical and a biological science to now requiring one course that covers both (team taught).
However, I would say that a significant reason that happened was because the other disciplines didn’t see science as relevant to anything. They just saw the science requirement as an obstacle to graduation, not anything that had any bearing on career readiness or being an educated citizen.
1 Like
This makes me cringe. The graduates are then considered as equipped for leadership and the making of policy.
1 Like
My institution did the opposite. HLC insisted on both a life science and a physical science to renew our accreditation. Doubled my class size and lab size with no corresponding increase in salary or even lab budget.
I tend to agree with Steven Weinberg on this one. Philosophy really doesn’t supply science with anything useful, outside of rather mundane axioms.
3 Likes