Our Three--No, Four Main Weapons...

I promised I'd get back to that comment about Marxism. Apparently biologists are fond of reading into biology their opinions as to socioeconomic theory. Convinced Marxists have found any number of biological illustrations of that philosophy, and committed capitalists likewise look to biology to substantiate their opinions. This probably reveals more about human psychology than anything else--our tendency to see what we want to see, a very important concept to keep in mind as we proceed.

Anyway, by the end of the controvery over the British Museum of Natural History's exhibit on Darwinism the consensus among the leading evolutionary biologists was that museums have no business telling the public about unsettled matters in science. This, it was supposed, would just confuse people. The role of a museum, instead, is to "educate" the nonscientist about prevailing "truth." In other words, a museum should be a propagator of received orthodoxy.

Under the barrage, the museum revamped its exhibit to toe the party line, while still trying to reassure visitors that evolution should not conflict with their religious beliefs. "Darwinists are very resentful if their theory is presented to the impressionable in a manner likely to encourage doubts...To Darwinists, teaching about evolution does not mean encouraging immature minds--or mature ones, for that matter--to think about unacceptable possibilities."

Lest the reader think this was an isolated incident that took place over a quater-century ago, consider the Dover (Pennsylvania) decision against intelligent design, the brouhaha over the creation museum in Kentucky, and the reception accorded the movie "Expelled" and the consequent tarring of the reputation of Ben Stein such that he has become persona non grata on some university campuses. You say you didn't expect the Spanish Inquisition? Well, no one does, but their fanatical devotion to materialistic naturalism has truly brought out the worst in some behaviors.