Magical Thinking

Bill Keezer over at Bill's comments has commented regularly on the evolution/creation debate.

I have this little thought to add. If readers are interested enough in the topic for me to expand further, let me know.

One of Bill's points is that creationism is bad for scientific research, without which many of our lives will be needlessly shortened.

I will go further.

Creationism is bad for democracy.

Let me 'splain.

One of the biggest problems with teaching the "controversy" over evolution is the poor quality of the creationist argument; almost all arguments resort to tactics that are disproven easily if the listener will listen to a complex argument. A good example is the claim that we have never seen transitional animals or speciation. Wrong on both counts, but an effective rebuttal relies on the listener having a relatively firm grounding in basic evolutionary theory; most members of the public and many students, particularly if they have already made up their minds, are unwilling to invest the effort necessary to understand the rebuttal.

So basically, teaching the controversy boils down to allowing intellectual laziness to triumph over empiricism. Even more damning is the next part of creationism's agenda: giving respectability to magical thinking - the practice of magically dismissing evidence contrary to our preconcieved positions.

Most of us are guilty of "magical thinking" at one time or another.

I used to believe that if we got rid of handguns, violence would drop. I often cited European crime statistics without realizing that there were a host of factors that made the America-Sweden comparison untenable, the most important of which was the general cultural homogeneity of our Scandinavian friend.

I would argue that the Maximum Leader engages in magical thinking when it comes to whether or not homosexuality is a choice. The scientific record adds study after study about the immutability of orientation and the Maximum Leader just puts his fingers in his ears and sings "La la la."

The two of us accuse the other of magical thinking about the Laffer curve. Of course I'm right and he's wrong (the Bush administration says so!), but that's an argument we have already beaten to death and into Valhalla.

We are all guilty of magical thinking. Hopefully Mike and I are only occasionally subject to this pernicious practice. But the general masses aren't occasional magical thinkers. They are magical thinking addicts. And magical thinking is bad for a democracy.

When the people think "I can have all the social services I want AND lower taxes AND a balanced budget," we are likely to elect public officials who don't seriously want to address the real world.

When people think that "Despite the contrary evidence of a thriving Black middle class, the primary cause of African-American poverty is systemic White racism," they are not going to seriously address the very real causes of the disparity between the races in America (I'd tackle the issue of single motherhood first).

When kids thin "Despite the overwhelming scientific evidence shows that smoking reduces life expectancy, my chain-smoking grandfather lived to be 90, so I'll be fine if I start lightin' up," kids will die. The magical thinking tactic of disproving a whole set of evidence by providing one anecdotal story is one of my favorites.

When voters say "Terrorism is a response to America's imperial hegemony," they don't actually stop to look at the real causes and real solutions. Instead, they start posting on the Democratic Underground.

So, there it is.

We ought not to teach children to ignore evidence that challenges what they already "know."

Next up:

Why creationism is bad for Christianity.