dogmatic denial of the science of evolution, aspects … · scientific creationism is the...

Analele Științifice ale Universității „Alexandru Ioan Cuza” din Iași, s. Biologie animală, Tom LXI, 2015

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DOGMATIC DENIAL OF THE SCIENCE OF EVOLUTION,

ASPECTS AND EFFECTS IN THE PUBLIC SCHOOL

Ion COJOCARU

Faculty of Biology, “Alexandru Ioan Cuza” University of Iași, B-dul Carol I, no. 20A, 700505 Iași, Romania;

[email protected]

Abstract. This paper mainly aims to report some implications on how biology is presented in the public school in

which it was introduced the religious dogma. Although educational policy is trying to suggest that there are no

consequences for ethics and accuracy of scientific information presented to the students, we show here that in

Romania the price paid by the school to popularize religious dogma is the censorship of biology by removing the

explanation of evolution (seen as an inconvenient truth) from the biology textbooks. In the same time, at the

religious discipline the concept of evolution is discredited and ideologically manipulated, being presented to

students as an instrument of communist ideology and philosophy of atheism. In the first part of this paper is

presented a brief history of the relationship between science and religious dogmatism. Among the main effects of

the ingress of religious dogma in the public school we mention: the use of Trojan Horse method (the Scientific

Creationism, in the USA, evolutionary biology textbooks with anti-evolutionist conclusions, in Romania),

complete elimination of the evolutionary biology with the tacit agreement of a majority of biology teachers (now

in Romania), the flat science (non-evolutionary science) and the pseudoscience.

Keywords: censored biology, flat science, pseudoscience, religious protectionism, public school.

Rezumat. Negarea dogmatică a științei evoluției, aspecte și efecte în școala publică. Scopul principal al acestei

lucrări este de a semnala unele consecințe ale modului cum este prezentată biologia în școala publică în care a fost

introdusă dogma religioasă. Deși politica educațională încearcă să sugereze că nu există consecințe în ceea ce

privește etica și corectitudinea informației științifice prezentate elevilor, noi arătăm aici că în România prețul plătit

de școală pentru popularizarea dogmei religioase este cenzura biologiei prin eliminarea explicației evoluționiste

(văzută ca un adevăr incomod) din manualele de biologie. În același timp, la disciplina religie conceptul de

evoluție este discreditat și manipulat ideologic, fiind prezentat elevilor ca un instrument al ideologiei comuniste și

filozofie a ateismului. În prima parte a acestei lucrări este prezentată o scurtă istorie a relației dintre știință și

dogmatismul religios. Printre principalele efecte ale introducerii dogmei religioase în școala publică menționăm:

utilizarea metodei calului troian (creaționismul științific, în SUA, manuale de evoluționism cu concluzii

antievoluționiste, în România), eliminarea totală a biologiei evoluționiste cu acordul tacit al majorității profesorilor

de biologie (acum în România), știința plată (știință non-evoluționistă) și pseudoștiința.

Cuvinte cheie: biologie cenzurată, știință plată, pseudoștiință, protecționism religios, școală publică.

Introduction

The Charles Darwin's theory of evolution, founded more than 150 years ago

(Darwin, 1859), still represents the conceptual and explicative basis of the evolutionary

biology. The random individual variation, the descent with modification and the natural

selection are the basic pillars, incontestable, for the evolutionary explanation (Mayr, 1989;

Jablonka, 2008; Cojocaru, 2010a). As a result, any progress offered by the molecular

genetics or the developmental biology can not avoids the Darwinian logic. Until now there

is no alternative scientific theory to Darwin's theory on the evolution, and the criticism

arising from the inside of science over time, made only to strengthen his position. Since its

inception, the Darwinian evolutionism was faced with a vehement denial from outside science - the ideological attacks (Cojocaru, 2010b). The creationists argue over a century

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that evolution is “a theory in crisis”, without being able to demonstrate why. The dogmatic

denial of the science of evolution, coming from the religious activists, aims to defend the

credibility of the religious dogmas, in the context of the development of science and the

secularization of the society.

The scientific community generally has not given great importance to attacks on

science made from unscientific, dogmatic positions. The dogmatic denial of the science of

evolution has become worrying when the mystic-creationist groups focused on controlling

the public school (Scott, 2009). This is the reason why the Scientific Creationism appeared

in the Unites States of America, a religion disguised as a science with the aim of enter in

school, given that the American state does not permit, under the Constitution, the religious

propaganda in the public schools. A similar phenomenon is happening today in the public school in Romania. The difference is that in Romania should not disguise religion in

science after the Trojan Horse method, under the name of Scientific Creationism, because

even Romanian State promotes religious dogma in the school and simultaneously censors

biology by deleting its evolutionist content and character.

This work represents an attitude coming from inside the academic environment

against the ingress of the religious dogmatism and censorship of biology in the public

school from Romania, and succinctly treats (1) a short history on the relation of religious

dogmatism to the science of evolution, and (2) the state of evolutionary biology in the

Romanian public school.

1. A short history on the relation of religious dogmatism to the science of

evolution

The religion considers the science of evolution a simple tool to promote its

own ideology. The Darwinian Revolution appeared in the age of so-called natural theology,

according to which the laws of nature, which are responsible for the apparent phenomena

(secondary cause), they are at the disposal of the divine entity (primary cause). Theologians

during the time of Darwin saw, in the Darwinian science, a support for natural theology that

look for evidence on how the Creator works in nature. The science reveals the Creator

intelligence, as considered Baden Powell (1796-1860), theologian and professor of

geometry at Oxford (Corsi, 2008), and Charles Kingsley, theologian, showed in 1863 that

Darwin convince “by the power of the truth and the facts” (Prenant, 1946). The natural

selection, discredited even by many scientists, it was for the theologian Aubrey Moore

(1848-1890) a rational fact of the teleological becoming in nature, a factor that gives sense to the movement in nature, as opposed to irrational hazard (Lepeltier, 2009). Moore not

suspects that Darwinism suggests the atheism and do not prefer the rising neo-lamarckism.

In the years 1880-1890, some Catholic theologians have joined evolutionism, without

accepting, however, the role of hazard pointed out by Darwin. Those who supported the

Catholic evolutionism also supported the modernization of the Church.

This first phase of the institutional denial of the science of evolution can be

considered naïve. The Darwin’s theory of evolution by natural selection just seemed to

open a little door prohibited by the divinity to theologians, through which they could look

something of the Creator’s secret mechanisms put in motion the living world. The idea that

God used the evolution as a tool of Creation is still taken up by different authors (Benedict,

2014).


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The religion totally denies the science of evolution. In the early 20th century, the

evolutionary biology was the greatest enemy of the theology, because it eliminated the role

of God in nature and so it was seen as the main factor supporting the atheism in society.

The idea of evolution, more detailed argued, explains the diversity of life, the origin of man

and also suggests the origin of life by a long chemical evolution.

The dogmatic denial of the science of evolution is a major public movement

involving religious dogmatics, defenders of eternal interests of religious institutions,

politicians – hunters of electoral successes, representatives of academia, either materially

corrupt or naive sentimentalists. The science was not directly affected by this dogmatic

denial. As Galilei remarked, science has not been an alternative to religion. The dogmatic

denial of the science of evolution, by the emergence of the scientific creationism, had as fundamental objective the control of the public schools by the religious organizations.

Among the defining ideas of this dogma, we mention: the creation of the world ex

nihilo to the will of an Agent from outside of matter; the recent age of the Earth, about 6000

years; the species of living beings were distinctly created by divinity and they are subjected

to change in predetermined limits; the fossils stored in the geological strata belong to the

creatures who died at the biblical flood that covered the whole earth; the geology has as

central explanation the catastrophism; the origin of living beings from a common ancestor

through evolution based on natural selection is not accepted; the man and the monkey have

distinct origins; the species were created directly by the Creator, after a divine Project and a

divine Purpose; there are perfect adaptations in the living world, and no natural selection,

nor macroevolution or hazard. The Scientific Creationism is not a unitar dogma, it comprises a variety of internal

forms, from the vehement contestation of the science of evolution and the acceptance of the

literal biblical text (Young Earth Creationism and Omphalos hypothesis), to the partial

admission of some aspects of the evolutionary thesis, as microevolution (Old Earth

Creationism, Gap Creationism, Progressive Creationism, Intelligent Design) (Shermer,

2015). In its inflexible and primitive form, the Scientific Creationism is based on a literal

interpretation of the Bible. It makes the metaphysical assumption that there is a priori a

creator of life whose origin is under examination. The Scientific Creationism rejects or

reinterprets the scientific evidence, the theories and the scientific paradigms about the

history of Earth, cosmology and the biological evolution.

This ideological movement emerged in the United States since 1920, when the

Darwinism was prohibited by law in schools (see “Scopes Monkey Trial” in 1925: Lepeltier, 2009; Shermer, 2015). The Creationism named "scientific" (in the sense of Henry

M. Morris) it is a Trojan Horse strategy of religious dogma’s penetration in schools,

dressed in the clothes of science, given that the US state prohibits by the Constitution the

religious propaganda in public schools. Thus, the Institute for Creation Research, in 1974,

published a manual for public schools – the "Scientific Creationism", in which there are no

references to the Bible or God in order to not to enter conflict with the Constitution. In the

American public schools was taught creationism alongside evolutionary biology until 1987

when the Supreme Court of the United States has banned the teaching of creationism

scientific, considered a form of religion (Lepeltier, 2009). The consensus of the opinion of

the international scientific community is that the Scientific Creationism is a religion, and

not a science’s point of view, because it lacks the empirical support, it not hypothesizes, and it refers to supernatural, untested causes. Virtually all the professional biologists

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consider the Scientific Creationism a fake. The only widespread “achievement” of the

Scientific Creationism is the undermining of authentic understanding (Atkins, 2013).

The religion partially admits the explanation of science and pretends that

complements it. The literal acceptance of the biblical text about the world creation in six

days, in the context of heady progress of scientific knowledge, has produced dissensions in

the creationist circles. Certain biblical utterances had to take a figurative sense, poetic or

metaphorical. As a reaction of ideological adaptation, a creationism of compromise is born,

which admits certain affirmations of the science of evolution, to avoid the mythical story

elements. We note here the Old Earth Creationism and the Progressive Creationism. The

Old Earth Creationism admits the great age of the Earth, scientifically dated; the existence

of Biblic Flood; the species are created directly by the Creator; it admits the microevolution (evolution within species) but it does not admit the macroevolution (evolution of the

species one from another). It denies the creationism of the biblical text, giving the

impression of modernization. The Progressive Creationism admits the very old age of the

Earth, scientifically dated, and it does not admit the Flood; the species originate in the

direct creation plus evolution; it not admits a common ancestor. It denies the creationism of

the biblical text, giving also the impression of modernization.

The total failure of the Scientific Creationism of the late 1980s in the United

States, in an attempt to corrupt the system of national American education, has generated a

reaction to reorient the American Christian dogmatism. The result was the emergence of the

Intelligent Design in the early 90s. The authors of this neo-creationism (Forest & Gross,

2004) admit the evolution, but not totally self-determined, admit a project, a divine purpose, perfect adaptations; the creative force in the living world is not the natural selection, but an

intelligent cause and the hazard are seen as a purpose of this universal intelligence; and the

universal intelligence is no other than God.

The evolutionary theory is not denied, but this is considered insufficient and

limited. According to this thesis, the science needs the divine help, and the evolutionary

science can not explain what they call "irreducible complexity" and "specified complexity"

(Alexander, 2010). A structure with irreducible complexity could not arise through gradual

evolution based on natural selection, from certain simpler stages. As examples, there are

brought: the structure of bacterial flagella, blood coagulation system, the immune system

(Shermer, 2015). Because the each part of a system is necessary to the system functioning

as a whole, it would result that the system could not evolve through selection in stages.

The Intelligent Design does not manage to rise to the level of a scientific theory, it does not provide the mechanism by which the postulated supernatural interventions would

create the complexity. The science succesfuly gets to explain what the followers of

Intelligent Design thought that is irreducible complexity, by enunciations made still Darwin

as the intensification of the function followed by the change of function. The

complexity would be "irreducible" if any given system component would not be achieved

and other independent functions. The studies showed that in all cases invoked, the system

components considered irreducible, originally had other functions (Ayala, 2008; Shermer,

2015). Today the Intelligent Project is discredited, both the scientific and religious

communities, who look their god made a second hand creator agent, after the forces of

Nature.

The religion formally recognized the evolutionary explanation – the theistic evolution. This stage of the formal recognition of the science value by the theology, is


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characterized by two strategic directions of the theology: the invocation of a dialogue

between science and religion, which should lead to a harmony between science and

religion; the undermining, concomitantly, the science values by promoting the

pseudoscience, as a bridge between science and religion.

“Dialogue and harmony between science and religion”. In the 13th century,

Thomas Aquinas demanded a harmony between science and religion because, according to

him, both converge towards one single truth – the truth of religion. The contemporary

creationist strategy consists of cover up the defeat of religion in the historical dispute with

the science. To divert attention from this ideological failure, the religious activists invoke,

unilaterally, a "science-religion dialogue" with the community of the scientists. The role of

this alleged dialogue is to give the impression that religious point of view is important, even relevant in the process of the knowledge, and the religious issues to seem to be of actuality.

The theologians demand, under that alleged dialogue, the establishment of a "harmony

between science and religion" to maintain the illusion of reconciliation between religion

and science, between the Church and secular society. Many times, in the support of

theologians also come even academics, who, without any scientific justification, tried to put

secular science in the service of theology (Vernet, 1986).

The failed theology, now called "theology of nature" (Russell, 2013), "the new

natural theology" or "contextual theology" (Polkinghorne, 2010) mime a reaction of

adaptation to cultural and modern scientific standards, often operating with scientific

terminology and new theological interpretations (Russell, 2013). But, as Michael Shermer

points, the mere use of scientific terms does not means science (Shermer, 2009). The so-called new natural theology is no longer considered absolute and supreme in matters of

knowledge, as in the Middle Ages, but it is limited to a specific framework and necessary

complementary to the scientific approach: “The new natural theology did not try to compete

with science on its land, but rather to be its complementary, putting her findings in a more

understandable context” (Polkinghorne, 2010). Also, “the theology is an effort undertaken

in search of truth, and when it is done in the context of science it is likely to see quite

clearly the need for openness to correction and change” (Polkinghorne, 2010).

The open theology, as it was called by Polkinghorne (2010), conceives a God in

providential interaction with predetermined natural processes and with the acts allowed by

divinity of free agents. It's called “open” to not seem dogmatic and to be able to accept

today any it denied yesterday: “The biblical texts, which are often very concise when

expressing profound truths and challenging, need continuous interpretation, carried out individually by each Christian” (Polkinghorne, 2010). The promoters of the open theology

are adepts of an a priori dualistic perspective, accepting the theses and apparatus

methodology of the modern biology, but placing God in the background; instead, an

evolutionary biologist, R. Dawkins, with atheist and strictly scientific vision becomes

cataloged “reductionist” (Knight, 2009).

The harmony invoked by the new theology is false, the science being placed in the

theological thought patterns, in order to hide the irreducible contradictions between the two

areas. Objectives are attributed to Science, which it does not have (both science and

religion “search motivated faith” – Polkinghorne, 2006), and the manipulation of terms to

create confusion is not abandoned, “all religions have their dogmas, as do all sciences” –

Pollack, 2007). If both the religion and science have their own dogmas would mean that they are equal in regard to the relevance of the knowledge capacity. But in science the term

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"dogma" is totally different from the one assigned by religious sphere. The scientific dogma

is a false conception or limited true, transient, that science will eliminate or redefine, while

religious dogma is an explanation that claims to be the absolute truth (Russell, 2012),

without any "error probability" (Russell, 2015), does not require evidence and tries to

subordinate in any way, the entire process of knowledge, to rudimentary equipment of

enunciations which it contains.

In the new theological strategy, the logic and the scientific theory are regarded as

divine plane (theistic evolution), such subordination of science to the religious framework

(Scott, 2009) being classified by the theology as “harmony between science and religion”.

The great “revelation” of the new natural theology is that Science, which for centuries has

been persecuted by the Church in Europe, is actually the work of God. Effect of the ideological failure that was mentioned above, the copyright of evolutionism is taken from

Darwin and passed in the God record: “the evolutionary processes occur endlessly ... and

are in accordance with the idea of benevolent God” (Gregersen, 2007). As a result, the

theology now reachs to popularize the heresies of yesterday: a “creative evolution”

(Polkinghorne, 2010), an “evolutionary creationism” (Alexander, 2010), divine creation is

accomplished through a “natural self-organization” (Gregersen, 2007). “As a theologian, I

believe the Neo-Darwinist position compelling, except of the pretension of explanatory

self-sufficiency” (Gregersen, 2007). Through the propaganda of the theistic evolution (also

called Theological Darwinism), the defunct new theology gives to understand that science

must be seen in a theological context.

The theistic evolution is convenient not only to the failed theology, but also for the faithful of scientific profession, who find themselves in a hopeless situation of theological-

dogmatic point of view. Here's what say the scientist and believer Francis Collins (former

director of the International Human Genome Project) in The Language of God, published in

2006: “No serious biologist today doubts the theory of evolution to explain the marvelous

complexity and diversity of life. In fact, the relatedness of all species through the

mechanism of evolution is such a profound foundation for the understanding of all biology

that it is difficult to imagine how one would study life without it.” And further: “Darwin's

theory of natural selection provides a fundamental framework for understanding the

relationship of all living things. The predictions of evolution have been borne out in more

ways than Darwin could have possibly imagined when he proposed his theory 150 years

ago, especially in the field of genomics” (Collins, 2006)".

Collins, resuming an old idea of Saint Augustine (Augustine, 2006), recommends caution even for cases in which appeals to divinity in situations where science can not

explain something. He calls this imprudence, “God of the gaps” and shows that after a time

the science can provide an explanation universally accepted, God's role becoming null and

useless. In this regard, he cites past battles lost by the Church in confronting with science:

explaining the eclipses, movement of the planets. This situation can only bring prejudice to

the dignity of the infallible religion. Collins points out: “Faith that places God in the gaps

of current understanding about the natural world may be headed for crisis if advances in

science subsequently fill those gaps. Faced with incomplete understanding of the natural

world, believers should be cautious about invoking the divine in areas of current mystery,

lest they built an unnecessary theological argument that is doomed to later destruction”

(Collins, 2006).


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The scientists attracted by creationism, which apparently want reconcile the

science of evolution with religious dogma, is facing unsolvable capital problems, scientific

and theological. One example is the reconciliation of predetermined Plan’s dogma with the

hazard that occurs in evolution (e.g. mutagenesis, random recombinations, random

crossing-over, random copulations etc.). “The solution” was imposed without any

demonstration or intellectual restraint: the planned hazard! (the hazard is part of a

predetermined plan): “…the chance is not a final, but a penultimate reality. It is God who

directs evolution through chance”; “God acts in various ways, acting the time and place of

mutations” (Gregersen, 2007). Finally it is suggested that evolution is a natural process free

of pre-imposed forces: “The God's omnipotence does not mean that God can do anything

...” says Polkinghorne (2010). Richard Dawkins quite rightly said, in 1986, about theistic evolution that is a futile attempt to “sneak out the back door God” (Dawkins 2009).

The new theology that wants to put a monopoly on the word evolution, reserves,

however, the right to give not account awkward questions: “the theologian is guided by his

faith motivated, not by reliable assertions” and “Neither the religious faith should not

expect that holds certainties beyond any boundary - because the believers believe without

seeing” (Polkinghorne, 2010). The theistic evolution or the current neo-creationism, despite

the parade of pseudo-modernization, does not differ at all from the rigid and primitive

dogmatism of the religion, and the idea of a dialogue is completely undermined as long as

any scientific assertion becomes will of the Creator, and the scientific truth is subordinate to

“the religious truth”. The international scientific community of professional biologists

ignore the dogmas of the theist evolutionism, a fact that, ironically, favors, in many countries, the entry thereof without resistance to their national education systems (Dawkins,

2006; Hitchens, 2012).

Pseudoscience. The strategy of the new natural theology and contemporary

creationism is to gain credibility, at any price, in the context of the cultural emancipation of

the human society. The dialogue science-religion can not resolve any problem related to the

objective explanation of the world, its main role being to maintain in the informational and

cultural environment a confused state, by distorting the scientific data or the manipulation

of the words’ property. This confused state appears as a "gray zone", cloudy, where there is

no a clear distinction between real and unreal, between natural phenomenon and miracle,

between science and religion. Just so the religious dogmas can remain in actuality. The

result of these actions is the pseudoscience, a literary genre more widespread today (Sagan,

1979, 1996) also in the book production from Romania. The pseudoscience has an older history in the period when the natural

theology tried to use the science as a tool for arguing the religious dogma. In 18th century,

books appeared whose title was obvious in this regard: Insectotheology (1735),

Testaceotheology (1744), Ichthyotheology (1754) (Botnariuc, 1961), Geology of the

theologians (1800) (Lepeltier, 2009). Recently it talks of Neurotheology (Newberg et al.

2008). A recent study show that D’Aquili and Newberg’s attempt to show that mystical

experiences are sources of knowledge about a transcendent reality must be regarded as a

failure (Miller, 2009).

Considerable efforts, including financial ones, are made for the production and

maintenance of the pseudoscience; these efforts take the appearance of a transnational anti-

scientific activism. The Templeton Foundation, with a current budget estimated at $ 1.5 billion (Harris, 2013), financially supports any activity, anywhere in the world, to carry out

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bridges between science and religion. The purpose seems noble but the result is the

pseudoscience, “a literary genre” which also has developed in Romania since the 90s. With

the support of this American foundation, it was published under the title "Science and

Orthodoxy - Research and Education" a whole series of books to promote the creationism.

To be noted the forced connections made between scientific concepts and different

religious themes: “quarks, chaos and Christianity” (Polkinghorne, 2006), “the naturalistic

theory of creation” (Gregersen, 2007), “the biological Judaism” (Pollack, 2007) etc., and

“mystical-scientific explanations”; “God can influence the world, continuously, ascendant,

by the quantum processes” (Gregersen, 2007), and the evolution of life it is thus directed:

“because the quantum phenomena can cause genetic mutations, and God, in mysterious

ways, could selects between the quantum processes, in fact undeterminated...” (Gregersen, 2007).

If in the past, the pseudoscience took advantage of the weak development of the

science, now it is an obvious form of ideological manipulation since there are alternative

explanations - those offered by Science. The pseudoscience eludes critical thinking,

relativize the validated methods of science, is not based on testable hypotheses, does not

presuppose research programs competing, does not have academic recognition, is based on

number of followers, it depends on the credulity, are addressed to emotional needs and

make reference to the miraculous or supernatural, may represent a response to an

ideological command. „For what a man had rather were true he more readily believes”

Francis Bacon said (in Novum Organum Scientiarum, 1620), a fighter with scholastics

pseudoscience, “that mixes the knowledge of nature with Theology” (Bacon, 1957). For some pseudoscience it is important because it gives the impression that

reconciles religion with science. A main factor of generating and maintenance into society

of the pseudoscience and scientific illiteracy is the introduction of the religious dogmas and

the censorship of science in the public school. As the great American scientist Carl Sagan

said in his book The Demon-Haunted World - Science as a Candle in the Dark (1996):

“Religions are often the state-protected nurseries of pseudoscience, although there's no

reason why religions have to play that role” (Sagan, 1996). To all these it is added the lack

of reaction of the academic environment. Since 1767, the illuminist scientist Samuel

Formey said “The Academies have the task of making to reign a purified, solid knowledge”

(Vovelle, 2000).

2. Evolutionary Biology in the public school from Romania In the public school from Romania the science of evolution was removed from the

general education of primary and secondary school, instead the students are indoctrinated

with religious dogma. Although the concept of evolution is the most important concept in

biology (Mayr, 2001) and “the most powerful integrating idea in all of biology” (Sagan,

1996), in the public school no lesson is allocated for presenting the mechanism of evolution

based on variability and natural selection. Charles Darwin, surnamed in the global

biological literature “the father of biology”, remains a big unknown for students in

Romania.

The science of evolution has been removed from the public school because it

indirectly ridiculed the so-called religious discipline. The evolutionary biology bothers the

religious dogmas in three major issues: the origin of life, the origin of species diversity and the human origins. The elimination of the science of evolution from the public school - the


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censorship of biology, is the price paid by biology so that the religious discipline to be able

to operate in the school without the risk of falling into the ridiculous (religious

protectionism).

The biology without the evolutionist orientation was reduced to the state of Flat

Science, metaphysically isolated by its own general conclusions and by the convergent

conclusions of other sciences. Although the Education Law provides, in Art. 3: paragraph

(n), “the principle of freedom of thought and independence from ideologies, religious

dogmas and the political doctrines”, the leaders in education have subordinated the

fundamental conclusions of the science to dogmas and to religious superstition.

The science of evolution has been removed from school without any scientific or

pedagogical justification. The concept of evolution or the Darwinism is repudiated and any reference to evolution is minimized or directly denied in the public school. The various

aspects of evolution are not presented as facts, but as simple hypotheses, views, opinions of

some (Iftime & Iftime, 2001: 44). Today, modern biology is based on the synthesis of

classical Darwinism (natural selection theory) and genetics. Genetics has allowed

explaining the variability - the source of natural selection and evolutionary factor, but

biology textbooks show this fact superficially (Dumitrache et al., 2006) or not at all.

The public school from Romania has a dual character, claiming to have legitimacy

only the scientific values which do not bother the Church ideology. The students are

indoctrinated and misinformed with the thesis that the science of evolution is harmful

because it was supported by the Communists, and also, the science of evolution is not

actually a science, but a philosophy of the atheists, which has one goal – “to denigrate and destroy the religion” (Muha, 2012). By the introduction of the religious manipulation in

school, the public school was thrown into the political populism. Regarding such facts,

Darwin said: “in Science does not apply dictum Vox populi vox Dei”.

The elimination of evolution from the school curriculum, in the conditions of

teaching religious dogma, it is, in fact, the prohibition of the right of science reply against

the religious indoctrination in the school space. For example, in the chapter “The dialogue

between the faith and science” of the Religion Auxiliary Handbook, for students of Class

XII, by Cornelius Muha (2012: 44-46), the Ministry of Education approved as students to

learn: “The evolutionism is not based on any real basis”, “Not found any fossils to support

evolution”; “Could not demonstrate the existence of new species that evolved from others”;

“No fossil nor any physical evidence does link man to apes”. “Adaptation does not mean

evolution. The biology can not explain the transformation of an animal without eyes into an animal with eyes”, etc. Independently of our opinion about the science education in public

school, we have here clear examples of anti-science approved by the Ministry to students.

On these assertions published in a manual of religion, the dual school does not offer to

Science any right of reply, and students must accept these allegations as absolute truth with

no alternative. Just a biology censored may be in the apparent harmony with the religious

dogma in the curriculum. Without the science of evolution, Biology is a flat science, an

accumulation of data: descriptions of shapes, functions, mechanisms and laboratory

techniques, and nothing about the historical transformation of the living world. The

mentality of flat science in education led either to avoid the term "evolution" in the

textbooks, or at falsifying its significance. So, the manual “Sciences” for the 12th class

(Garabet et al., 2007) says nothing about the evolution of species, but has a lesson titled “Evolution from egg-cell to mature biological organism”, the biological evolution being

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shown to students as ontogenetic development like two centuries ago, inexcusable error in

science today. Only in this way, by force of censorship and misinformation, Biology does

not threaten the anachronistic dogmas of the religion. “If we could censor Darwin, what

other kinds of knowledge could also be censored?” wondered the well-known American

scientist Carl Sagan (Sagan, 1996).

Surprisingly and unacceptable is that censorship of Biology related to the

evolutionist explanation has been implemented with the tacit agreement of the biology

teachers - textbook authors or members of the advisory committees for programs and

textbooks in the Ministry. Before the elimination of the science of evolution from the

curriculum, the evolutionary biology has been undermined by the Trojan Horse method,

even in the textbook of evolutionary biology. Thus, the authors of the evolutionary biology textbook for 11th and 12th classes (Iftime & Iftime, 2001) have recognized in a book with

religious subjects written by them (Evolutionism and Orthodoxy 2009: 9), that in their

manual of evolutionary biology, above cited, “we have demonstrated that the hypothesis of

biological evolution was unable be proven in no way”. However, this manual has been

approved by experts from the Ministry in the field of biology. It is a case of negligence or

tacit and systematic approval of creationism in the school and denigration of the

evolutionary science? In these conditions, the biology teacher has a decisive role on how

the science is presented to students in the classroom. But, an American study (Raymond &

Dunn, 1990), as well as our own observations, shows that sources of pseudoscience in

schools can be even the biology teachers.

The Evolutionary Biology conclusions represents an incommode truth for the public dual school from Romania. It is amazing that in the middle era of science and

technology, of culture and rational thinking, more and more voices from the scientific

world non-political and non-religious ask today the emergence of a new Enlightenment that

obviates the official obscurantism from education supported by governments (Sagan, 1996;

Hitchens, 2012; Wilson, 2013).

Conclusions

The dogmatic denial of the Science of Evolution does not affect the biology as a

science, but becomes a major problem when it influences the teaching of science in public

schools. “The mixing of science with religion leads to absurdities”, says Nyala Farouki,

historian of science (Farouki, 2008). The flat biology (non-evolutionist biology), made

under the order religious dogma, is not at liberty to provide students answers to the current knowledge, fundamental issues such as the origin of biological diversity, the origin of life

and human, history of our planet, man's place in nature. From the history of dogmatic

denial of the Science of Evolution is clear that the fundamental goal of this movement is to

maintain credibility of religious dogmas in society and, implicitly, of the respective

religious institutions.

The dogmatic denial of the Science of Evolution lacks proper valuable content, is

full of internal contradictions, being split into numerous creationist current contradicting

each other, not only with the science, and the reporting to science is purely conjectural. The

creationist strategies, made ad hoc, ranging from the denial of self-determined evolution as

a natural phenomenon up to formal acceptance of evolution as a phenomenon (theistic

evolution), non-self-determined, but part of a illusory divine plan. It is not possible a rational and constructive dialogue between science and religion. The theme of this dialogue


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is a sociological strategy, not a cultural one or gnoseological. The neo-creationism current

no longer opposes the religion of science, as these would be domains of conflict, but seek to

relativize the theory of evolution (Picq, 2007). The idea of theistic evolution is the

expression of this skilful strategy.

If in the public school are accepted the religious dogma, as a school discipline and,

also, the anti-evolution propaganda, while the science of evolution is removed from the

biology textbook, then we can conclude that biology, as a school discipline, is censored.

Such a situation exists currently in the public school in Romania. “The evolutionism is not

based on any real basis”..., the purpose of evolutionism is “denigration and destruction of

the religion”, writes a religion textbook approved by the Romanian Ministry of Education

in 2012 (Muha, 2012), while the biology curriculum contains nothing about the evolutionist explanation of the transformation of the living world. Has the student, in this case, the

freedom to judge comparative between the scientific and religious vision? The main

responsible for this situation, in our opinion, is the academic environment, with political

support, which tacitly tolerated the removal of the evolutionist content from Biology and

the systematic subordination of the science to religious dogma. The public school should

not be a land of dispute between science and religion, and the school must submit the

progress of Science. If we refer to France, divergences of opinion on the relationship

between science and faith “remain marginal, expressed outside the school” declare in 2007

the Inspector General of National Education (Mamecier, 2007).

The censorship of the science in schools, in particular the Biology, the flat science

(non-evolutionist science), the pseudoscience, the religious protectionism in the school environment are the dangerous cultural phenomena that currently threatens the education

system in Romania, and the society as a whole.

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*** Legea Educației Nationale, Monitorul Oficial al României, anul 179 (XXIII), Nr. 18, din 10.01.2011.

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