When We Want to Know How Old the Earth is Do We Ask a Preacher?

In recent weeks, the Ohio state house of representatives passed a law that allows students to answer questions with religious information and thus can’t be penalized for it.   The law is said to allow a student to write an essay on Jesus if asked about the greatest living human, but it clearly has the ability to challenge the teaching of scientific principles and facts like evolution in public schools.  The idea is that a student shouldn’t have to give up a religious belief for a grade and I agree.  But it looks to many that it can be extended to allow a student to not answer certain questions with a religious response when asked for a scientific one;  that is troubling.  The age of the earth for example is not 6000 or even 10,000 years old, as some believe. 

One can argue that both science and religion explain the way the world works and exists.  In fact there are many who believe that their canonized scripture is the only way and that any discovery that contradicts it is simply wrong.   A sign as you enter the Creation Museum in Kentucky, a so-called museum not far from the Ohio border that teaches the Biblical narrative of creation as fact reads something to the effect of:  Any discovery that challenges the facts of the Bible must be wrong.    

If the most expansive reading of this law is applied, then there is a problem with how grades will be given out.  Holding a belief is not the issue, using it in place of a scientific fact is problematic.  When you take a class and get a grade it is not just for you, but it tells the next person you encounter what to expect of you.  My Organic Chemistry professor put it like this in college “I can give you all As but then the next person that sees you in an academic or work setting will expect you to have knowledge you may not have and you will fail.  Better to learn it now when you have a chance to master it then when there are higher consequences”.  That stuck with me both as a student and an educator.  The grade must be an agreed upon standard.  If you were to allow a student to think the world is 6000 years old and validate it with a grade that could be a problem in the future.  It will also mean that if a student attends a university outside of Ohio they may run into a rude awakening.     

Facts should matter in school and frankly everywhere.  There is a growing trend to elevate so-called alternative facts, as an advisor to the President once said.  The idea that things don’t have to be accurate, if one has a strong belief in what they are saying.  What Steven Colbert once called truthiness.  Facts must be the center of knowledge.  While there are many places that opinion can come into the education process, the facts of science must be known to get a good grade in a science class, even if you reject them for religion.      

I applaud Ohio for trying to clarify that when students bring their faith into their assignments they must not be penalized or told they can’t do so.  Students who have strongly held beliefs who are being educated in public schools do have a right to their beliefs, and they should not be made to change them.  They can discuss them in class within reason, as long as they don’t disrupt other’s education.  But when asked about evolution, the age of the earth, or disease theory they should have to answer with the facts that they were taught.  Even if they reject them.  I am not a fan of Piaget’s theories of development, in fact I think he is wrong.  However, I learned them, I know them, I can be critical of them from an understanding of them, and I passed my test on them in college.   

We don’t know if the law will ever be enacted, nor how it will be applied.  It may open the door a crack to try to bring in alternative views that oppose the scientific view.  It might be a way to protect the religious freedom that sometimes comes under attack in a school setting when ignorance of those rights is the norm.  However, I think there is a way to write a law that protects the freedom without expanding it beyond what education should be.  We will need to keep an eye on this.  Knowledge drives a free people.  Ignorance is easily exploited and we can suffer the consequences of ignorance in the future if we are not careful.  Maybe we already are.