When I was in public school in the 1980s, I was given the opportunity to join the gifted and talented program in Kindergarten. I was removed from my regular classes and given quizzes on the different shapes, numbers, and letters. As a reward for my perfect scores, the school counselor gave me certificates showing my proficiency, but then she sent me back to my regular class with a warning. She said, “Make sure when you return to class, you hide these in your backpack before anyone can see them. You don’t want your friends to feel bad that they didn’t get an award.” In my 6-year-old mind, I thought it was an odd request, but at that age, you always do what adults ask you to do, so I obeyed. I was so nervous that one of my friends might see the awards, that I rushed to my backpack and stuffed them in first thing. When my peers asked where I went, I refused to answer the question.
All that secrecy did not work, though, because three years later, at the same school, my peers started to beat me up every recess break. My parents decided to organize a meeting with the principal to make her aware of the situation, but they did not get the results they expected. They sat with me and the principal as I explained to her my mistreatment. Her response was, “You need to be more thoughtful of their feelings. Kids at this school have a hard life, and many of them did not eat breakfast. That leaves them cranky, and you’re not being sensitive to their emotional needs.” Thankfully my parents pulled me out of that school, as they were so upset with an administrator that would pit other students’ feelings against their daughter’s welfare. However, the experience was a very early, very real illustration of what public education was becoming in the 1980s. Phyllis Schlafly deftly explains the change in her book, Child Abuse in the Classroom, published in 1984. This was the year that the U.S. Department of Education passed that Hatch Amendment, which required that public schools share their surveys and pupil evaluations with parents. Much like the Covid lockdowns and Zoom classrooms did nearly 40 years later, the Hatch Amendment revealed to parents what their students were being taught in public schools, and they were shocked. Schlafly calls it child abuse, because rather than educating children, the hearings regarding the Hatch Amendment clarified that students were being taught psychotherapy techniques in the classroom. Much of this psychotherapy was indistinguishable from brainwashing techniques used in the Soviet Union. Rather than traditional reading, writing, and arithmetic, public school children were taught to discover their own feelings, confide in teachers, rather than parents, situations that made them feel uncomfortable, and put them in compromising ethical situations that broke down psychological barriers between themselves and the teachers. Since this was already happening in the 1980s, it can hardly be surprising that 40 years later, the state of California just passed a law outlawing parents from knowing what their children are doing in public school.
In the early 1980s, parents became aware that there was something seriously amiss in public school “education.” As a result, this was the rise of many alternative schooling situations including homeschools and the foundations of private, evangelical schools. One of these branches, the classical Christian school movement, began during this time as well. Rather than just remove the offending bits of modern education, the classical Christian school movement argued that even the method of modern education was a problem. The classical movement drew on examples from both ancient Greece and Medieval Europe to return to a much older tradition, one that pre-dated the Enlightenment entirely. The classical, Christian school movement is now over 40 years old, and is on the third generation of students. After starting from only 3 schools, the Association of Classical Christian Schools now represents hundreds of schools across the country. Since the classical method has been such a powerful tool in educating students, there are now many classical public charter schools and classical publishing houses for curricula.
One publisher of classical Christian materials is Classical Academic Press, which was founded in 2001. Classical Academic Press provides materials and media to public charter schools, homeschools, and classical Christian schools. As part of their curricula, Classical Academic Press offers a science and math program entitled Novare Science and Math. Why write a new science curriculum? The Novare Science website states that there are several reasons why a new science curriculum is needed in classical Christian schools. First of all, Novare points to big, thick textbooks as one of the reasons why students don’t like science. Since classical education programs are often closely associated with great books programs and an emphasis on the works of Western Civilization, one might wonder if an antipathy to large textbooks is antithetical to the classical tradition. Secondly, Novare Science and Math claims that students don’t like science because most of the textbooks are filled with “media hype.” This they define as the cluttered, image-filled textbooks that tend to overwhelm and distract, rather than focus on concentration and instruction. Similarly, Novare also points to poor graphics as one of the reasons why students shun science. “Silly images” and “cool” style, fonts, and design “lack aesthetic sensitivity,” thereby turning students away. Lastly, they believe that most science curriculum “dumbs down” their material. Curriculum includes busywork or simple matching/fill-in-the-blank type activities that bore older students quickly. All of these criticisms are pretty easy to make of any type of curriculum that is marketed to K-12 education. In fact, it is very easy to see any curriculum that is 15-20 years old and claim that there are silly images and out-of-date styles.
Since Novare caters to both public charter schools and Christian schools, they have a separate link on their website with considerations for Christian educators. For example, they note that many secular textbooks are not useful for the private Christian school because they leave faith out of the discussion entirely. However, Novare also has room for criticism of other Christian science textbooks. They state that often publishers present poor or erroneous material in Christian textbooks. They say that the Christian faith is often represented in a “cheesy” or ham-fisted” way. They criticize publishers who include lots of Bible verses or devotional materials, and even those that denigrate non-Christian or non-Evangelical scientists. Again, rejecting curriculum for either not being Christian at all, or being much too Christian is an easy accusation to make. One can hardly reject secular curriculum for being secular. If this was the problem, then why bring secular curriculum into the discussion at all? And without examples of devotional guides or “cheesey” Christian material, one is left up to one’s own imagination to picture whatever backward, Bible-thumping bogeyman one would like. However, the last criticism of Christian science curricula seems to be where Novare has been aiming at all along. This is where Novare focuses on the problem of the “Young Earth Debate.” As their website states, “Finally, virtually every Christian science textbook publisher is overtly committed to an agenda of rejecting mainstream scientific evidence pertaining to the age of the earth.” Although their first criticisms had to do with textbook style, and the following ones on the appropriateness of textbooks in Christian education, this at last seems to be Novare’s major problem with most of the science curriculum available to Christian schools. The fact that they reject the “mainstream scientific evidence pertaining to the age of the earth.”
This begs the question, what is the problem with rejecting the mainstream scientific evidence pertaining to the age of the earth? A student of natural philosophy might note that rejecting the mainstream scientific evidence for a particular scientific theory has been the basis of the Scientific Revolution for the last 500 years. Rejecting Aristotle is what gave the western world Copernicus, Galileo, and Newton. Copernicus rejected the mainstream scientific evidence pertaining to the structure of the universe. Galileo rejected the mainstream scientific evidence pertaining to earth’s orbit. Isaac Newton rejected the mainstream scientific evidence pertaining to the nature of motion. Building on the shoulders of the 15-18th centuries, Louis Pasteur rejected the mainstream scientific evidence pertaining to the nature of spontaneous generation. Albert Einstein even rejected the mainstream scientific evidence of Newton. One might even be hard-pressed to describe a scientific discovery that did not begin with rejecting the mainstream scientific evidence pertaining to some particular theory. In fact, there are some who would argue that the very nature of science itself is to reject mainstream scientific theories. On what basis is Novare criticizing these Christian textbooks?
The answer seems to lie in Novare’s philosophy of science, which is not as easy to find on their website. The first textbook that Novare carried is John Mays’ Introductory Physics book, which is intended for 9th grade students. In the first chapter, Mays outlines his definition of science, which states that science is the “process of using experiment, observation, and logical thinking to build ‘mental models’ of the natural world. These mental models are called theories” (Mays 9). Mays believes that the fundamental purpose of science is to devise theories. Lest there be any confusion on the matter, Mays goes on to say that theories are “the grandest thing in science,” and are “the glory of science” (Mays 10). In Mays’ definition of science, the individual scientific “facts” become provisional, while the theories are the foundation. Science is so theory-based, he believes, that scientific facts on their own have no meaning without a theory. As a result, Mays even questions the value of a counter-example. “If a theory is not confirmed by an experiment, the theory might be weakened, but it is not disproven” (Mays 10). Galileo might take issue with this particular assertion.
Mays is adamant about his physics-first approach to science education. Over the last 100 years, high school science curriculum tends to begin with Biology and ends with Physics. Mays believes that this is a problem because it trains students learn science in a “descriptive” way rather than a “systems” way. This approach to science education is the practical outworking of his belief that science is fundamentally based on theory. Physics tends to be heavy on theory and concepts, but has traditionally been held to experimental standards in its reliance on Calculus. However, high school freshmen have only just been introduced to Algebra and Geometry, so a reliance on Calculus at this early stage is impossible. Therefore teaching physics to freshmen will magnify its theory predominance, as the most challenging math will need to be edited out.
Mays’ particular definition of science is not a novel idea, but it is not the original conception of a theory coming from the Scientific Revolution. In the 17th century, Francis Bacon first outlined the logic behind the scientific method. Rather than a positive assertion as to the truth of a scientific theory, Bacon saw a theory as a rejection of anything unrelated to the phenomenon. One might characterize this by saying that science cannot prove anything, it can only disprove. This definition of a scientific theory is ultimately based on the experimental evidence that creates it, rather than the other way around. A scientific revolution will commence when experimental evidence disproves a theory, and a single counter-example has the power to do just this. Two hundred years after Francis Bacon, the natural philosopher Karl Popper used Bacon’s idea of a counter-example to develop the logic of falsification in scientific study. Science can only make claims that could be proven wrong, which means that a theory makes predictions about a phenomenon that may later turn out to be false. Rather than using the theory to interpret the evidence, every theory is subject to falsification by the scientific evidence. Popper’s definition of a scientific theory is fundamentally based on its ability to disprove the cause of natural phenomena, rather than the cause.
Although Mays says that science is based on “theory,” his definition of theory seems more like a “paradigm.” Seventy years ago, in his book The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, Thomas Kuhn defined a scientific theory as “universally recognized scientific achievements that, for a time, provide model problems and solutions to a community of practitioners” (Kuhn ??). This is a redefinition of scientific theory as a positive affirmation of natural phenomenon, which is the same argument that Mays is making. Rather than empirical evidence, Kuhn believed that a scientific revolution occurs when scientific consensus moves toward a different paradigm, which he called a “paradigm shift.” Kuhn states that “Once a first paradigm through which to view nature has ben found, there is no such thing as research in the absence of any paradigm. To reject one paradigm without simultaneously substituting another is to reject science itself” (Kuhn 79).
This new definition of a scientific theory will, of necessity alter how a scientist conducts experiments. In Kuhn’s philosophy, the purpose of scientific experiments was “part of the competition between two rival paradigms for the allegiance of the scientific community” (Kuhn 144). To be even more clear, Kuhn puts very little faith in the ability of the natural world to teach scientists laws by empirical study, but great faith in the agreement of scientists. “As a result, the reception of a new paradigm often necessitates a redefinition of the corresponding science. Some old problems may be relegated to another science or declared ‘unscientific’” (Kuhn 103). Paradigm shifts create a drastic change in the view of scientific truth. As Kuhn states, “What were ducks in the scientist’s world before the revolution are rabbits afterward” (112). This would mean that Aristotlean physics actually did work, until Isaac Newton invented Calculus. Kuhn has no positive words to say about those who may argue for unchangeable natural laws, “I would argue, rather, that in these matters neither proof nor error is at issue. The transfer of allegiance from paradigm to paradigm is a conversion experience that cannot be forced” (Kuhn 150). This religious devotion to paradigm shift continues, “Conversions will occur a few at a time until, after the last holdouts have died, the whole profession will again be practicing under a single, but now a different paradigm” (Kuhn 151).
If all facts about the natural world are dependent upon an interpreting paradigm, then all truth becomes relative, and there can be no natural laws. Kuhn rejects objective truth, and fully repudiates rationalism. However, the classical Christian community is not prepared to be so intellectually consistent. To avoid outright relativism, John Mays argues for a distinction between truth and knowledge. In his Introductory Physics textbook, Mays lays this out clearly by saying that there is only one truth, God’s truth, but that there are different kinds of knowledge.
Mays is trying to keep God’s truth separate from scientific knowledge, but to do so, he ends up re-defining the word “truth.” He states that truth is the way things really are, but then explains that there are 3 different ways to know truth; first by empirical observation, second by logical deduction, and third by revelation from God, although he acknowledges with that God’s revelation is only embraced by some. If people are allowed to disagree on metaphysical or religious claims of truth, why not self-evident or logical truth claims? There are often times when people should question the evidence of their eyes, or even the evidence from logical syllogisms, since a syllogism is based on rational thought. By raising a question over metaphysical truth, but not over empirical or logical truth, Mays is actually destroying the one thing he believes that he is building up. Rather than keep God’s truth separate from scientific truth, he ends up destroying the only foundation for logic and reason.
One might easily argue that if a rational God is not running the universe, on what basis do we trust the evidence of our eyes, or especially the logical reasoning of our senses? If Mays was going to be consistent, he would acknowledge with Thomas Kuhn that science is only a product of the society in which it is practiced. Karl Popper noted that relativism ends up destroying any basis for rationality because science becomes real only within the mind of the scientist. He identified this as the social determination of scientific knowledge, where “scientific thought, and especially thought on social and political matters, does not proceed in a vacuum, but in a socially conditioned atmosphere” (Popper 420). Just like Kuhn, Mays ends up agreeing with Immanuel Kant whose theory of knowledge declares that all science is relative because truth is relative (Popper 421).