Mr. Dawkins, tear down this wall!

I am somewhat unusual as a scientist and evolutionary psychologist, in that I strongly support the teaching of creationism and intelligent design in schools. I personally don’t understand why my fellow scientists in general and evolutionary psychologists in particular oppose it so vehemently. Perhaps it’s because I’m old enough to remember (and to have been educated during) the Cold War.

It’s sobering to recall that it is the 20th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall this year, and that all of my undergraduate students were born into the world where there were no East and West Germany. To them, East and West Germanies are as historically quaint as East and West Roman Empires are to me. During the Cold War, we taught our children what capitalism was and what communism was, whereas children going to school in the Soviet Union and the rest of the Eastern Bloc countries never learned what capitalism was. They learned falsely negative views of capitalism and equally falsely positive views of communism. My wife was one of these children.

The communist political leaders did not allow their citizens to be exposed to accurate portrayals of capitalism because they knew, deep down, that anyone who learned what capitalism truly was would naturally opt for it instead of communism. They therefore could not allow their citizens to learn what it was. We, on the other hand, had no such worry, because we knew that anyone who carefully compared capitalism and communism would naturally opt for capitalism. We did not build a wall to keep our people in; anybody who wanted to emigrate to the Soviet Union was free to go. We had entry visas; they had exit visas. Communists had to build a wall to keep their people in, because they knew what would happen if they didn’t. We all learned that they were right in October 1989. We won the Cold War, not because we didn’t allow our citizens to learn about communism, but because capitalism was a genuinely superior economic and social system than communism.

No one who has a better idea or product is ever afraid of an open competition; politicians who can win a majority of the votes fairly and openly never rig the election. So why are scientists, who are supposed to be all for academic freedom of expression and thought, actively trying to suppress creationism and intelligent design in schools? Why are they afraid of an open competition? Why are they acting like Stalin or Mugabe?

Teach our children both evolution and creationism in schools. Any intelligent child who is confronted with comprehensive and accurate views of evolution and creationism will naturally opt for evolution. Those who don’t and instead believe in creationism deserve to live in the dark. Not everybody deserves the truth.

Of course, there is the argument that we shouldn’t teach creationism in schools because it is not true. It is true that it is not true. But then virtually everything they teach in the sociology and women’s studies departments on every college campus throughout the world is false. Yet nobody is calling for sociology and feminism to be censored and banned from schools, and I for one would certainly not support such censorship. I believe anyone who wants to study sociology and women’s studies should be entirely free to do so. Any intelligent student who is confronted with comprehensive and accurate views of evolutionary psychology and sociology will naturally opt for evolutionary psychology. Those who don’t and instead believe in sociology deserve to live in the dark. Not everybody deserves the truth.

Another possible objection is the separation of church and state mandated by the Constitution. Maybe the Constitution needs to be amended slightly to allow the teaching of creationism in schools (although I personally don’t think the teaching of creationism in public schools is a major breach of the separation of church and state). The Constitution is not a perfect, prescient document (after all, it’s not the Bible!); that is why there have been so many amendments to it. Whether we like it or not, creationism – the fact that so many people believe in it, especially in the US – is a fact of life that we can neither change nor ignore. It is better to confront it head on and expose its flaws than to ignore it, hiding behind the Constitution. If we continue to ignore creationism in school, the children can never eliminate the possibility in their mind that it just might be true.

I think it’s time that we scientists stopped acting like our product – the theory of evolution by natural and sexual selection – was somehow inferior to creationism and intelligent design, and we could not win the competition for best ideas fairly and openly. We should stop acting like the communists during the Cold War.