Read Your Civic Biology

My last post referenced the Scopes-Trial-inspired movie, Inherit The Wind, from 1960. As I pointed out, many liberties were taken with the facts of the case. One item that was inspired by actual events was a sign Darrow (Drummond in the movie) felt was very prejudicial which implored people to read their Bible. Drummond suggested he might have one put that implored people to read their Darwin. In real life Darrow suggested he should place a sign which invited people to "read your evolution" or "read your Civic Biology."

 

A Civic Biology by George William Hunter was the textbook from which teacher John Scopes was charged with using to teach human evolution. Is there a reason the movie changed "read your Civic Biology" to "read your Darwin?" I think perhaps there is.

 

William Jennings Bryan (Matthew Harrison Brady in the movie) comes off in Wind as mentally unstable, highly illogical, and morally lacking as well. This all is far from the truth. Bryan was a sincere Christian (hardly the crude Bible-thumper portrayed in the movie) who was indeed against human evolution; but it appears that he feared that science at this point was attacking the dignity of man as a special creation of God.

 

His objections to (then) current scientific thinking were based on the damage he felt was being done to the dignity of humankind. He had prepared a closing statement that was never delivered because Darrow decided to halt proceedings by asking the jury to find his client guilty. In that speech, which was later released to the public, Bryan stated:

 

Science is a magnificent force, but it is not a teacher of morals. It can perfect machinery, but it adds no moral restraints to protect society from the misuse of the machine. It can also build gigantic intellectual ships, but it constructs no moral rudders for the control of storm tossed human vessel. It not only fails to supply the spiritual element needed but some of its unproven hypotheses rob the ship of its compass and thus endangers its cargo. In war, science has proven itself an evil genius; it has made war more terrible than it ever was before. Man used to be content to slaughter his fellowmen on a single plane—the earth's surface. Science has taught him to go down into the water and shoot up from below and to go up into the clouds and shoot down from above, thus making the battlefield three times as bloody as it was before; but science does not teach brotherly love. Science has made war so hellish that civilization was about to commit suicide; and now we are told that newly discovered instruments of destruction will make the cruelties of the late war seem trivial in comparison with the cruelties of wars that may come in the future.

 

Nearly a hundred years later his words seem prophetic. Remember: two decades later science had developed and man put into use the awesome power of nuclear weaponry.

 

With special attention to Bryan's observation about science's lack of moral restraint, there are elements of Hunter's biology text that are quite telling. One shocking quote from this text stated:

 

When people marry there are certain things that the individual as well as the race should demand. The most important of these is freedom from germ diseases which might be handed down to the offspring. Tuberculosis, syphilis, that dread disease which cripples and kills hundreds of thousands of innocent children, epilepsy, and feeble-mindedness are handicaps which it is not only unfair but criminal to hand down to posterity. The science of being well born is called eugenics.

 

Elaborating further Hunter adds:

The Remedy. — If such people were lower animals, we would probably kill them off to prevent them from spreading. Humanity will not allow this, but we do have the remedy of separating the sexes in asylums or other places and in various ways preventing intermarriage and the possibilities of perpetuating such a low and degenerate race. Remedies of this sort have been tried successfully in Europe and are now meeting with success in this country.

Again looking back we now know how Hitler's Germany put the science of eugenics to work and what the heartrending results were.

Hunter's science textbook also promoted racism:

The Races of Man. — At the present time there exist upon the earth five races or varieties of man, each very different from the other in instincts, social customs, and, to an extent, in structure. These are the Ethiopian or negro type, originating in Africa; the Malay or brown race, from the islands of the Pacific; the American Indian; the Mongolian or yellow race, including the natives of China, Japan, and the Eskimos; and finally, the highest type of all, the Caucasians, represented by the civilized white inhabitants of Europe and America.

Here I have to agree with Bryan: "Science is a magnificent force, but it is not a teacher of morals." It is for that reason that I feel the scientific worldview alone is not sufficient. At the same time I don't feel the religious worldview alone will cut it, either.

The truth is: either science or religion can be abused and used to inflict harm. I'm not impressed with those on either side who would downplay the importance of the other. I don't see why we can't embrace both.  

Darwin Was Wrong

Darwin was wrong. Man's still an ape. His creed's still a totem pole. When he first achieved the upright position, he took a look at the stars - thought they were something to eat. When he couldn't reach them, he decided they were groceries belonging to a bigger creature; that's how Jehovah was born.

 

Those provocative words are from the 1960 movie Inherit The Wind, inspired by the famous Scopes "Money Trial," and were uttered by the character E.K Hornbeck (based on journalist H.L. Mencken) to character Henry Drummond (based on defense attorney Clarence Darrow). Mencken was the one who dubbed it The Monkey Trial.

 

Neither Mencken nor Darrow were friends of religion, although I think Drummond comes across as more sympathetic than Darrow actually was. However, it is a pity that Inherit The Wind gives most folks their basic knowledge of the famous Scopes Trial. It would hardly qualify as a docudrama in that it was based on the play by the same title and both took great liberties with the actual trial and events surrounding it.  

 

The acrid Mencken was - not inaccurately, I believe - described by the late atheist popularizer Christopher Hitchens as "an antihumanist as much as an atheist, a man prone to the hyperbole and sensationalism he distrusted in others...."

 

While the Hornbeck quote is not an actual Mencken quote, it does seem to capture the flavor of the man. Unfortunately it also underscores a popular theme among many modern atheists, that is, that the God hypotheses was born of human ignorance rather than the quite reasonable idea that something coming from nothing and then operating in an orderly manner would seem fantastical.

Faith Is Not Stupidity

Stupidity is not faith. Superstition is not religion. Asserting that we believe what we have never taken the trouble to inquire whether we believe or no, is not piety, but cant. Persuading ourselves we believe what we dare not investigate, for fear of discovering that we disbelieve, is not orthodoxy, but hypocrisy. Professing that we believe what we see to be contrary to reason, and therefore essentially unbelievable, proves not our regard for religion, but only our indifference to truth.  - Alfred Williams Momerie (1848-1900), Congregational minister, professor of logic, metaphysician.  

 

I had questions about my faith and plenty of them. Some things just "didn't add up," at least in my thinking. Things I had been taught to believe did not seem to match the reality surrounding me.

 

For a long I searched for answers. Indeed I found possible solutions to many of my intellectual difficulties. Others I placed on a shelf in the back of my mind and determined to keep an open mind.

 

However, it was the emotional aspects of my disappointment with my religious faith that finally turned me. Oh, not at once. But that back shelf of unresolved problems now had the added weight of my disappointment and I soon bowed out of religious faith altogether. 

 

That isn't to say I didn't feel the occasional pull of God from time to time. But once I had committed myself to a godless outlook, it wasn't long before I equated religious faith with stupidity. With that it wasn't long before I was looking down my nose at simple believers, including close friends and family members. My own inner turmoil was spilling out.

 

For nearly thirty years now I have earned my living by supervising workers. Living as I do in America's Bible Belt, the majority of these folks have been people of faith (even various faiths) - of varying degrees, to be sure. Of course I've also encountered unbelievers and those some place in-between. 

 

From experience I can say that it really does seem to matter what worldview a person embraces. Also along the way I learned to listen a little better. My emotional reasons for leaving my faith were countered by the emotional reasons for others hanging on to theirs.  

 

There remained the intellectual problem for me to grapple with. And grapple I have over the years. I admired my faithless friends, so unemotional in their thinking - until it came to attacking those who questioned their lack of belief. Then I saw plenty of emotion! 

 

I was fortunate to have an atheist coworker and friend who took a lot of time to help me understand basic science better. That had always been one my weaknesses in school. Why not - I was taught it was very often in conflict with my religion?

 

But as I continued to study the matter over the years I became impressed with the role that the human religious impulse played in both science and philosophy throughout history. I came to appreciate how all of it revolves around the basic fact that existence seems to be reasonable and understandable - intelligent, in a word.

 

It now occurs to me that one can have a reasonable faith. That back shelf of my unresolved intellectual difficulties is now bigger than ever, but that's okay. I only wish more believers would enlarge theirs - it would help things along considerably. Religious extremism remains a big problem. It is a perversion of faith.

So Offensive To God The Angels Speak It Not

This week a letter-to-the editor appeared in a local newspaper that weighed in with a Christian response to homosexuality. Here in the US Bible Belt that topic gets lots and lots of attention. As you can guess, the more conservative forms of Christianity holds a big sway over minds here.

Anyway, this 81-year-old letter writer turned a phrase that automatically caught my attention for both its emotional stimulus and poetic flair. Describing homosexuality he suggested:

It is so offensive to God that even the angels speak it not.

(How he arrived at that conclusion he doesn't say, but his entire letter can be read by clicking this link and scrolling down to The Consequences of Homosexuality.)

Now if that writer has a right to exercise his imagination on this topic, surely I do as well. I read the above letter and sat back in my chair with closed eyes trying to imagine a God who - in this world filled with human foibles and then outright inhumanity towards one another - is so offended by two of his creatures of the same sex sharing carnal pleasure, why, that the mere discussion of it with him by his angels is off limits.

I presume angels discuss unmitigated human greed. They probably couldn't help but notice our penchant for killing one another. How could they possibly miss our deep-seated habit of deceitfulness? But if humans find erotic pleasure with one of the same sex, why, God supposedly goes all fire and brimstone.

No, I just can't take the bait that angels can't discuss homosexuality with God for fear of offending Him. On the other hand, I can see some religious folks getting all obsessed about their prejudices and confusing them with divine ordinances. When that happens the imagination can surely run wild.