Anti-evolution and the death of biology in Turkey

[Lionel Mandrake]

Where the Darwinian theory of evolution is officially discouraged, biology dies. It happened in the bad old Soviet Union under Stalin, when the crackpot ideas of Lysenko held sway. It is happening right now in Turkey, where Moslem fundamentalism is rampant. Christian fundamentalism such as we are afflicted with in the USA seems relatively benign by comparison with the horrible situation in Turkey. IMO the EU should force Turkey to cut out all this shit if it wants to become a member. These angry thoughts of mine were inspired by the following article which appeared in a publication of the American Physical Society (APS):

Attitudes towards teaching evolution in Turkey
by Zehra Sayers and Zuhal Özcan

The theory of evolution occupies a central place in modern biology, but a very different place in the public sphere. It is vilified by politically and religiously conservative organizations, and is widely misinterpreted by the public. Here we describe some subtle (or not-so-subtle!) changes that have been shaping evolution instruction in Turkish secondary school education.

In Turkey, where the structure and content of primary and secondary education is developed and regulated by the National Education Ministry (NEM), coverage of evolution in curricula is influenced strongly by national political trends.1 In early years of the Turkish Republic (up to about 1945), evolution was introduced in history textbooks as a well established scientific truth in the context of history of humanity. Later, as populist religious rhetoric in the political scene became stronger, evolution was relegated to science and biology curricula and at the same time instruction became unsystematic and superficial; textbooks’ treatment of evolution became ambiguous and less assertive. After the 1980 military coup, NEM’s stand against teaching evolution culminated in the inclusion in biology textbooks of creationism as an alternative theory for origin of life on earth. Since 2001, evolution’s textbook presence has further diminished. Currently, only those students who choose a science-oriented track have any exposure to evolution, and this is in the second term of the 12th (final) year, when they spend most of their time not at the school but preparing elsewhere for the central university entrance exam. It is interesting to note that religion instruction, introduced in the 1980s and expanded in the later years, is now compulsory for all students between 5th and 12th grades.

In the 1983 edition of a standard high school textbook, evolution merits its own chapter. In the 2011 edition, by contrast, evolution is part of a chapter called “The beginning of life and evolution” in which creationism is also discussed. Another interesting difference between the two books relates to the meaning of “scientific theory”; the recent version treats the concept as an open-ended, indefinite opinion rather than a fact, reducing it to an unclear hypothesis. It is not only high school education that is affected. There are no universities in Turkey offering undergraduate or graduate degrees in evolutionary biology or in related fields, and even courses in the area are hard to come by.

Read more:
http://www.aps.org/publications/apsnews/201306/international.cfm

[CaliforniaPeggy]

1. That is a shame.

It's interesting (as well as horrifying) to see how evolution tanked while creationism rose. I agree that Turkey needs to cut this shit out if it really wants to become part of the EU. The way the government is behaving towards the protestors makes me wonder if they really do want to do that.

K&R

[Ilsa]

2. The population on the planet is getting

Too large. Only way to control the masses is to dumb them down, feed them religious crap about a god who has selected very few to have plenty.

[CaliforniaPeggy]

3. I agree that the population is getting too large.

But normally, religion wants its members to reproduce so as to dominate others, and the planet as well.

[Ilsa]

4. Yeah, that too, if the dominating group

believes the crap that the ultra conservative religious orders are selling them.

[Xipe Totec]

5. They will have to deal with the other tenant of Evolution; Natural Selection. nt

[longship]

6. Let's not kid ourselves here.

The USA is only marginally above Turkey of major western nations in support for biology. In fact of the forty-some countries in these surveys, only Turkey is below the USA. All the rest are above the USA.

So let's not gloat too much about USA above Turkey. The two of us are at the bottom of the heap.


Hard to read, Turkey at bottom, USA is next to bottom.

That's shameful.

[Lionel Mandrake]

7. By what criterion is the USA only marginally above Turkey?

A source for your graph would be helpful.

In my experience, biology is doing very well in the USA despite the fundies. It's true that our high schools do a poor job of teaching evolutionary concepts, but this failing, as bad as it is, is being compensated by the introductory courses for biology majors in colleges and universities. Such courses include what is effectively remedial instruction in evolution. Furthermore, I would maintain that our universities are second to none in biological research.

[pokerfan]

8. Level of public support for evolution

In some countries, creationist beliefs (or a lack of support for evolutionary theory) are relatively widespread, even garnering a majority of public opinion. A study published in Science compared attitudes about evolution in the United States, 32 European countries (including Turkey) and Japan. The only country where acceptance of evolution was lower than in the United States was Turkey (25%). Public acceptance of evolution was most widespread (at over 80% of the population) in Iceland, Denmark and Sweden.[125]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Level_of_support_for_evolution#Public_support

[Lionel Mandrake]

10. Interesting.

I was in Iceland a couple of years ago. I found the people to be almost exclusively Lutherans, and quite devout. Just goes to show that religion doesn't necessarily conflict with science.

[pokerfan]

13. It's also apparently quite secular

Iceland is a very secular country: as with other Nordic nations, religious attendance is relatively low. The above statistics represent administrative membership of religious organisations, which does not necessarily reflect the belief demographics of the population of Iceland. According to a study published in 2001, 23% of the inhabitants are either atheist or agnostic. A Gallup poll conducted in 2011 found that 60% of Icelanders considered religion to be unimportant in their daily lives, one of the highest rates of irreligion in the world. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iceland#Religion

[Lionel Mandrake]

15. It's difficult for many Icelanders to attend church.

Except in and near Reykjavik, the population of Iceland is thinly spread. Churches and congregations are tiny. A typical Lutheran church can't afford to hire a full-time pastor. That might explain part of the relatively low attendance.

For a truly secular country, consider the Czech Republic.

Religion in the Czech Republic was dominated by Christianity until at least the first half of the 20th century; since then it has steadily declined and today the Czech Republic has one of the least religious populations in the world. Religions other than Christianity make up a small minority, with the largest being Buddhism.

Historically, the Czech people have been characterised as "tolerant and even indifferent towards religion". According to the 2011 census, 34.2% of the population stated they had no religion, 10.3% was Roman Catholic, 0.8% was Protestant ... and 9.4% followed other forms of religion ... From 1991 to 2001 and further to 2011 the adherence to Roman Catholicism decreased from 39.0% to 26.8% and then to 10.3%; Protestantism similarly declined from 3.7% to 2.1% and then to 0.8%.

According to a Eurobarometer Poll in 2010, 16% of Czech citizens responded that "they believe there is a God" (the lowest rate among the countries of the European Union), whereas 44% answered that "they believe there is some sort of spirit or life force" and 37% said that "they do not believe there is any sort of spirit, God or life force".

Read more:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Religion_in_the_Czech_Republic

How indifferent are the Czechs to religion? When my wife and I were in Prague, we visited the grave of Tycho Brahe, which is inside the Tyn church. The church was practically surrounded by a maze of shitty little stores. We had a hell of a time finding our way to the front door of the church. There was a meandering path through the maze of shit, but there were no signs pointing to the path. I am not making this up.

[longship]

9. In the USA support evolution is consistently near the bottom.

There has been little change in decades.

It is a very sad situation.

The chart comes from National Geographic, but similar data can be found from any number of sources.

Here
From NatGeo.

Here's decades of polling from Gallup:
http://whyevolutionistrue.wordpress.com/2013/04/10/latest-gallup-poll-on-u-s-acceptance-of-evolution-flatlined-as-usual/

Here's the Gallup graph from above link:


I am not making this up. This has been known for a long time and recent political and education trends are making things more difficult to turn this around.

[Lionel Mandrake]

12. Thanks for the clarification.

I see reason for optimism in the last chart. It shows that since 1982:

1. The fraction of people who believe that "Humans evolved, but God had no part in the process" has increased from 9% to 16%.

2. The gap between "God created humans in present form" and "Humans evolved, with God guiding" narrowed from 6% to 2%.

These are healthy trends. Let's hope they continue.

[longship]

14. Well, they may not with bills like in LA becoming law.

So far attempts to repeal it have been unsuccessful in spite of super human effort like from Zack Kopplin who started the fight while in high school.

This one is a bad one because it's one that doesn't say anything about intelligent design or creationism, so there's nothing one can do to challenge it on that basis if one wants to take it to court.

[goldent]

18. I don't think that chart provides much support for saying

The USA is only marginally above Turkey of major western nations in support for biology.

That chart is about the percentage of people accept evolution - not a strong connection.

In fact, the US is very strong internationally in biological research, biochemistry, genetics, etc. In American high schools, biology is a popular AP subject (sixth, and most popular natural science). I think it has more than a little support!

[longship]

19. Really? Not so much as you think.

In high schools? Not so much as you think.

Check out the NCSE Web site for details at the number of states putting forth legislation to impede biology education statewide.

In Louisiana, the law is such that teachers can add "supplemental materials" counter to curriculum in the name of "balance". Of course, Jindal is also raping public education with an accelerated move to charter schools, some of which coincidently happen to be teaching a biology curriculum from Bob Jones University which teach that dinosaurs and humans lived at the same time less than 10,000 years ago.

Do I have to remind you of the number of states with Republican governors and legislatures?

Like the women's issues, the religious right is not going to stop this nonsense. We are going to have to vote them out of office.

One positive note, the KS Board of Education has adopted science friendly standards, for now, that is. That seesaw has gone back and forth before though and the KS state legislature and governor are still loony as they get.

I do not share your optimism on this issue as long as the situation is like it is.

Again, check out NCSE for the details.

Thanks for your response.

[Lionel Mandrake]

21. Louisiana is only one state,

and the law there is blatantly unconstitutional, like laws that have been shot down by the courts in other states. I am familiar with the NCSE website, and I see reason for optimism in their reporting of creationists losing battles in state after state.

Having said that, I also see reason for pessimism in the fact that many high schools do a poor job of teaching biology. Part of the reason for this is that some high schools (and even some community colleges) still have creationists teaching biology.

[longship]

22. Indeed.

That's what I was attempting to say.

Unfortunately, these new laws are more difficult to challenge in court. One has to actually have a violation and that might take an individual stepping over the line. The question is whether a court would rule an entire act unconstitutional on that basis.

[JoeyT]

11. We're graded on an average, not based strictly on the top scores.

I'd say maybe a bit more than a third of the people I know believe evolution to be true. I know that sounds awful, but it's actually above the norm for my state. 26% for mine, 22% for a neighboring state. (The two are at the bottom of everything, so it isn't hard to figure out which they are.)

[DreamGypsy]

16. Here's a bigger image...

...and if you turned it on its side, you'd see that it's that same data as pokerfan's reply #8...though I prefer the dark red, yellow, blue bars over pokerfan's pale green, purple, blue.



Explanation of the chart is here.

[WovenGems]

17. Knowledge

It be kinda like a genie. Once out very difficult to put back in the bottle.

[Lionel Mandrake]

20. It's difficult, but not impossible, for knowledge to disappear.

For example, the knowledge of reading and writing that the Romans had brought to England disappeared soon after the Roman legions left in 410 CE. The 5th and 6th centuries are a dark age, for which there are very few written sources. Very little will ever be known about what happened in England during this period.