Çiğdem Atakuman should be back at work
Güncelleme Tarihi:
Oluşturulma Tarihi: Mart 16, 2009 00:00
As current debate in Turkey and elsewhere over evolution and the work of Charles Darwin grows increasingly absurd, we offer our own explanation of the fight’s origins: "The Theory of De-evolution."
Our theory (not to be confused with the 1970s rock band Devo) holds that the various shades of the challenge to Darwinism descend from a common ancestor. Creationism, intelligent design, theistic biology and other psuedo-scientific disciplines may seem different in appearance. Proponents will argue their distinctness. In fact, they are rooted in the same ignorance, the same impulse that seeks to censor scientific reason that conflicts with inherited beliefs. As such, when presented as science, they take us backwards. In place of ideas that enable us to evolve and progress toward improved understanding, these are ideas that take society in reverse. Within them are the seeds of de-evolution.
Such "de-evolutionary" precepts and arguments have no place in scientific journals or in public school science or biology curriculum.
This is not to say we call for a ban on any discussion of creationism or intelligent design. We welcome such debate in our editorial pages. If an intriguing argument comes along that says Galileo was wrong, that the sun orbits around the earth after all, we will print it as commentary. But it will not be presented as science.
Some weeks ago, we published a report by reporter Sevim Songün on the success of Turkish cult leader Adnan Oktar in making Turkey a world center for creationist research. His foundation has published books in some 43 languages, sent the six kilogram "Atlas of Creation" free to academics around the world and organized more than 3,000 anti-evolution conferences, from the University of Oxford, in Cambridge, to Tokyo to Tel Aviv. We defend his right to engage his such de-evolutionary practices.
But it is also the view and editorial policy of the Daily News that as science, this is just claptrap. Darwin’s theory of evolution, as the central organizing principle of biology, is only "theory" in terms of the scientific method. It’s based on observable facts of genetic mutation and the periodic emergence of species. And there is no reasonable challenge to the worldwide scientific consensus that supports this explanation to the origins of life on earth.
Given this, the government’s censorship of an article on Darwin and the theory in the nation’s preeminent scientific journal, and the efforts to fire the editor-in-chief Dr. Çiğdem Atakuman, are reprehensible. So is the insidious introduction by state education officials of creationism and intelligent design into public school science curriculum.
Dr. Atakuman should be back at her desk. And the desks of Turkish classrooms should be cleared of de-evolutionary pseudo science.
Such "de-evolutionary" precepts and arguments have no place in scientific journals or in public school science or biology curriculum.
This is not to say we call for a ban on any discussion of creationism or intelligent design. We welcome such debate in our editorial pages. If an intriguing argument comes along that says Galileo was wrong, that the sun orbits around the earth after all, we will print it as commentary. But it will not be presented as science.
Some weeks ago, we published a report by reporter Sevim Songün on the success of Turkish cult leader Adnan Oktar in making Turkey a world center for creationist research. His foundation has published books in some 43 languages, sent the six kilogram "Atlas of Creation" free to academics around the world and organized more than 3,000 anti-evolution conferences, from the University of Oxford, in Cambridge, to Tokyo to Tel Aviv. We defend his right to engage his such de-evolutionary practices.
But it is also the view and editorial policy of the Daily News that as science, this is just claptrap. Darwin’s theory of evolution, as the central organizing principle of biology, is only "theory" in terms of the scientific method. It’s based on observable facts of genetic mutation and the periodic emergence of species. And there is no reasonable challenge to the worldwide scientific consensus that supports this explanation to the origins of life on earth.
Given this, the government’s censorship of an article on Darwin and the theory in the nation’s preeminent scientific journal, and the efforts to fire the editor-in-chief Dr. Çiğdem Atakuman, are reprehensible. So is the insidious introduction by state education officials of creationism and intelligent design into public school science curriculum.
Dr. Atakuman should be back at her desk. And the desks of Turkish classrooms should be cleared of de-evolutionary pseudo science.