The introduction was easier to write than the second post. I have so many ideas floating around that I need to work out, I am not sure which to address first.
I have heard of legislation that science teachers treat controversial topics as just that... controversial, permitting students to thoughtfully consider multiple perspectives on an issue and draw their own conclusions. Now, as a scientist, the idea of testing a theory always has its appeal for me. I have always felt that institutions that forbid thoughtful examination or questioning of the institutions are inherently weak. The idea that a government should prohibit it citizens to question the actions or motives of the governing individuals is appalling to me, both as a scientist and as an american. I extend this to religion when learning of historical pushes by various churches to micromanage belief systems of the people. So part of me looks at this legislation and thinks, well, duh.
Yet part of me panics a little inside. Yes, that's the control freak throwing a fit in there. Why? Because there are some issues that are so inflammatory, I'm not sure I trust many people to provide honest evidence that is not dressed up and loaded to drive home a desired point. Yes, that's right, I don't trust teachers (or anyone really) to be unbiased.
Let's take the issue of climate change as an example. Now, there are many different kinds of evidence that are appropriate in different settings. Different kinds of evidence may carry different weight. For example, "My kindergartener believes in global warming" is generally not considered as persuasive an argument as "We've had the hottest few summers on record in the past decade!" However, neither is really an appropriate scientific argument. Al Gore put together a movie on the topic which was designed to educate and persuade. And perhaps it did persuade many people. But most of the evidence he provided was selected because it appeals to emotion, has a visual impact, or can easily be put into sound bits to be passed along.
Showing a picture of a mountain or glacier from 50 years ago and last summer shouldn't persuade any scientist. It should make that scientist start asking critical questions: Were these photos taken at the same time of year? Was the precipitation similar for each year? Was the glacier/mountain in a similar state in the years surrounding this photo such that this is "typical" of its era? There are so many variables! Circumstantial evidence may at times persuade a jury, but scientists should be persuaded by fair tests which are reviewed, repeatable, and reliable. A photograph does not fit the bill.
I believe it is a good exercise to help our youngsters to sort through the kinds of arguments presented to them so they can evaluate which are trustworthy. Help the students understand that appeals to our emotions, celebrity endorsements, and even hand-waving arguments should be viewed with skepticism. The problem is that no one wants to really look at scientific evidence, least of all school children (followed closely by elementary teachers I imagine!) There is a protocol in scientific research that a scientist should provide detailed descriptions of experiments identifying every possible variable. Chemists will often include manufacturers of chemicals and model numbers of equipment. There are statistical tests of validity, which means that valid tests may be run dozens, hundreds, or thousands of times. Then all of this detail must be combed through by other scientists (reviewers) whose job is to pick apart any claim with potential weakness. This all before the information is published to the community of scientists who further analyze, comment, compare, and yes repeat the same tests. So the source is important. It is hard for a school child to really appreciate that "I read it in the Newspaper" doesn't carry anywhere NEAR the same weight as "I read it in a highly cited article from a peer reviewed journal ."
Okay, so the point is that it is way more interesting and fun to teach about global warming using anecdotal evidence and pictures than using data from scientific journals. And yes, you can extract the data, dress it up and point out the source. But if we need to show the conflicting views on the topic, some views just don't have much beyond anecdotal evidence. Some views have published data, but not from peer reviewed journals. Most adults couldn't easily recognize the difference between a well respected and thoroughly reviewed scientific journal and a pseudo-scientific journal funded and published by a politically motivated group writing solely to persuade. At best a teacher is put in the position of presenting evidence as equally valid which scientifically speaking is not. In the hands of the stubbornly contrary teacher, the scientific evidence becomes the boring convoluted mess that is apt to be overlooked amongst the more persuasive brightly colored yet inherently weaker evidence.
The truth of the matter as I understand it is that:
The atmosphere is a complicated system and we cannot predict with great accuracy how our influence on it will manifest itself in the coming months, let alone the coming decades, with great accuracy.
The fact that we cannot know something with certainty is not a good reason to ignore possibility, or likelihood, that a devastating impact is being or has already been made.
The overwhelming majority (greater than 99%) of people who have spent the better part of their adult lives in thoughtful study of the atmosphere and climate either through graduate work or true scientific research, honestly believe that the Earth's atmosphere can be and has been altered by the exponential growth of carbon emissions (including carbon dioxide and methane) caused in part by the growth in human population and energy use.
We can talk about other influences (volcanos and forest fires produce CO2) and the reliability of temperature measurements (most of the thermometers in the world are in the northern hemisphere and near cities which are inherently warmer) and the consequences of warming temperatures (more hurricanes or droughts? Rising oceans from melting glaciers? Hotter temperatures or sudden freezing from changing ocean currents?), but to present evidence contrary to the research of the people who have spent their lives studying this in equal weight is irresponsible, confusing, and may end up doing more harm than good in the wrong hands.
I taught in the public school system. I hated having people (department heads, principals, the district, the state test, etc) micromanage the way I taught. It was insulting that I could not be trusted at times to provide quality content. As strongly as I may feel about this content being mis-delivered, I also feel quite strongly that we need to trust our teachers to do what they have been asked to do and provide them with the tools to do it.
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