Respecting Derisory

By AM Wednesday, July 18, 2012

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This is not a case of censorship. We do not question the right of creationists to hold or expound their views, to write pamphlets and books, hold meetings, or set up websites; nor would we for our part demand to distribute articles on the scientific evidence of the age of the Earth in church halls. But we profoundly disagree with any suggestion that creationist views should be given space in publicly-funded museums or visitor centres that explain natural history, or in school science lessons or science textbooks -  Geological Society

It was with a lame parry of criticism, thrust its way for including aspects of creationism at its newly opened Interpretive Centre on the Giant’s Causeway, that the National Trust sought to defend its howler of a decision. To treat seriously, rather than something for display in the myths and legends section of some public project, a narrative that holds the world to be around 6000 years old is as daft as Young Earth Creationism itself. This rubbish has no claim to a run on the same track as geological science or evolutionary biology both of which trace the Cambrian explosion to about 530 million years ago, long, long, long ... ad infinitum before the 6000 life span that a former Northern Ireland culture minister ascribes to the planet. Run it as part of a circus by all means where its advocates would be indistinguishable from the honest clowns but never as a component of an educational facility.

The Causeway is a Unesco World Heritage Site with over around 650,000 visitors annually. It is meant to be a prestigious operation laying claim to serious educational and cultural attributes. It should not be put in the stocks to invite rotten fruit and offal to be thrown at it face-on because of crank creationism. £18.5 million pumped out so that modern dinosaurs can claim some sort of privilege for their antediluvian religious views.

The interactive exhibition in question includes an audio package re-enacting debates between historic figures, who argued over the origins of the Causeway, as well as their contrasting biblical and scientific beliefs on the origins of the planet.

The National Trust states ‘in this exhibit we also reference the fact that Creationists today have a different understanding from that of mainstream science.’ An understanding? A fundamental lack of understanding is more surely in order. A profound ignorance is the driving force.  

The Trust fumbling for something credible to say meekly stated that it had only acknowledged the existence of such views. But why should it have? It can hardly claim that their existence is something we are not already aware of.  No acknowledgement of the Flat Earth Society which is as plausible as Young Earth Creationism. The trust did not merely acknowledge hare-brained views; it elevated them onto an epistemological plateau where they simply had no place. Take the following from a National Trust spokesman:

We reflect, in a small part of the exhibition, that the Causeway played a role in the historic debate about the formation of the earth, and that for some people this debate continues today. The National Trust fully supports the scientific explanation for the creation of the stones 60 million years ago. We would encourage people to come along, view the interpretation and judge for themselves.

If it fully supports the ‘scientific explanation’ why then bother to reference bunkum like YEC? Well, the National Trust said it wanted to "reflect and respect" the existence of views that oppose mainstream science. That is like the recent EuroScience Open Forum in Dublin inviting witchdoctors to perform a rain dance. That type of thing might have had its place at the earlier Eucharistic Congress hosted in the same city on the basis of respect for a diversity of make believe perspectives. But not in a centre for science.

The National Trust fails to address the question of why it acknowledged YEC positions in preference to other equally ridiculous claims. And what is there for people to ‘judge for themselves’? That it might just be plausible that a flying spaghetti monster noodled us all up in a big frying pan that he cooked over the sun?

But this is where it gets really interesting. Wallace Thompson of the Caleb Foundation, a crackpot creationist cartel, while welcoming the inclusion of its nonsense could be found happily ‘dumping on the National Trust from a great height.’Although the Trust blandly stated that it had liaised with a number of bodies in the planning stage of the new centre, Thompson placed a significantly different stress on his group’s influence with the Trust:

we have worked closely with the National Trust over many months with a view to ensuring that the new Causeway Visitor Centre includes an acknowledgement both of the legitimacy of the creationist position ... we have therefore been engaged in detailed and constructive discussions with the Trust in order to secure the outcome we have today ... We want to thank senior National Trust officials who have worked closely with us over a prolonged period, and we are pleased that this constructive engagement has helped to bring about such a positive result.

So, the Trust did not generously reach out in a spirit of diversity and intellectual pluralism but allowed itself to buckle under creationist lobbying, something noted as worrying by geologist Dr Andrew Kerr: ‘the most concerning thing is that it is an organisation like the National Trust have given into pressure from the lunatic fringe, and their scientifically illiterate political supporters.’ In similar vein evolutionary biologist Jerry Coyne asserted that, 'make no mistake about it, this is a sop to creationists, lobbied for by creationists, and has nothing to do with giving an informative view of the Causeway.'

The ease with which the Trust responded to Caleb is ominous for the very reasons stated by Wallace Thompson: ‘This is, as far as we are aware, a first for the National Trust anywhere in the UK, and it sets a precedent for others to follow.’

So there it is: the religious insanity of the North of Ireland, which up until a few years ago was led by a theocrat, is now up for export elsewhere. The causeway risks being internationally renowned less for its giants of mythology and more for the intellectual pygmies trying to walk in their footsteps. None it it was the evolutionary outworking of logic but rather a stupid act of creation by the not to be trusted National Trust.