The universities and government in New Zealand are on the side of the woke, and the science professors are on the side of the angels. Since my piece was published, I have gotten over a dozen emails from academics in New Zealand objecting to the University of Auckland's new policy to teach creationism, alongside modern "real" science, in science class.
I don't want to insult the Maori people or the efforts that both New Zealanders are making to achieve harmony, but I can't abide the insistence that "wisdom" is a combination of both. You are entitled to your opinions, but you are not entitled to your own facts. The government and universities are trying to make up for the treatment of the indigenous people by European colonizers by incorporating their beliefs into the science curriculum. I applaud the drive for comity, but I don't agree with those who want to replace modern science with a melange of myths and faith. Indigenous knowledge can be valuable, but must always be tested using modern science.
The misguided effort to teach indigenous knowledge as equal with science will confuse the people who embrace indigenous ways of knowing. Suppose a teenager from New Zealand wants to be a physicist. There are only positions for physicists. Modern physics is just what it is, there is no American or Indian physics.
I wrote yesterday that seven academics from the University of Auckland wrote a short piece in The Listener objecting to the introduction of the way of knowing into science curricula. The "Satanic Seven" have been demonized instead of being defended. The Vice Chancellor of the University said that the seven don't adhere to the values of the University and that two of them are in danger of being kicked out of the Royal Society of New Zealand.
Vice Chancellor Dawn Freshwater sent a message to the University of Auckland community that claimed that denying that the way of knowing is science has caused considerable hurt and dismay. I don't want to be brutal, but that hurt and dismay doesn't matter in this debate. What is true, what is not true, and how to find the truth are the issues. Click to enlarge.
The antiscience drive must be stopped. If you want to see what the scientists in New Zealand are up against, read this piece.
Here is a little bit.
Secondary science teachers may believe that teaching science through the scientific method is in line with tertiary science education, so they may reject the proposed changes. This belief is flawed because modern philosophy of science accepts that there is no one scientific method, and because tertiary science teachers are under pressure to teach Mori. The next section looks at how science teachers could respond to the challenge of these changes in relation to the Mori concepts shown above.
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. The introduction of carefully selected Mori concepts is a positive move. It encourages science teachers to consider the philosophy of science in more depth, and it challenges deeply-held teacher assumptions about science and Mori knowledge. It is an innovative and interesting way to bring Mori concepts into school science, but it cannot overcome the entire history of lack of Mori participation and achievement in science education. The invention of a pressure-cooked lexicon means that it does so in a more meaningful way than translating science into Mori.
I won't go into the details, but suffice it to say that a lot of it involves forcing concepts into the Procrustean bed of modern science. Some Muslims claim that the Qur'an anticipates all modern science. It is a mess because of the colonial culture trying to effect rapprochement and the deep embedded culture of the Maori culture. When it comes to teaching science, there should be no compromises.
The international community can stop the debasement of science by calling out New Zealand. Richard Dawkins has taken a route that gives him more power. He issued this after reading my piece.
Creationism is bollocks even if it is called Indigenous Ways of Knowing. Doubtless of great anthropological and aesthetic interest but not science.
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The NZ Royal Society has a reputation for sexism.
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Please write to roger.ridley@royalsociety.org.
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December 4, 2021.
The chief executive of the New Zealand Royal Society is objecting to the idea of expelling two scientists who signed this reasonable letter. I put up the letter I wrote to Ridley after Richard gave the email. I urge you to send a short email in defense of science, for I think it will have an effect.
Richard gave me permission to reproduce his email. Here it is.
Dear Dr.
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I have read Professor Jerry Coyne's critique of the Royal Society of New Zealand's failure to stand up for science and the ludicrous move to incorporate the "ways of knowing" into science curricula in New Zealand.
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There are ways of knowing new knowledge and pushing it to be taught on par with modern science.
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There are thousands of creation myths and other colourful legends in the world and they can be taught alongside the Maori myths. Why do you choose the Maori myths? The arrival of the Maoris in New Zealand a few centuries before Europeans was a good reason. It would be a good reason to teach the mythology of the Maori people. Australian schools teach the myths of their indigenous peoples, who arrived tens of thousands of years before Europeans. British schools teach Celtic myths. Or myths from the Anglo-Saxons. No indigenous myths from anywhere in the world are allowed in science classes. Science classes are not a good place to teach scientific lies. Creationism is still bollocks.
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The Royal Society of New Zealand is supposed to stand for science. Not "Western" science, not "European" science, not "White" science, not "Colonialist" science. It's just science. It doesn't matter who does it, where, or what "tradition" they were brought up in, science is science. True science uses safeguards such as peer review, repeated experimental testing of hypotheses, double-blind trials, instruments to supplement and validate fallible senses, and more.
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Who will stand up for true science in New Zealand if the Royal Society doesn't? The Society is for other things. What is the reason for its existence?
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Professor of the Public Understanding of Science at the University of Oxford.
