General Discussion
In reply to the discussion: Kick if you agree with this assessment about the influence of religion on people. [View all]struggle4progress
(118,514 posts)But Dawkins' actual contributions to evolutionary theory are extremely limited. He was always mainly a popularizer, rather than a serious researcher, and in his later years his anti-religious agitation increasingly occupied his time
The failure of science education in the US is a serious problem, which is part of a larger failure of US education. American high school students, for example, on average read at about fifth-grade level. This is associated with an unwillingness to really commit resources to public education, including keeping class sizes down to twelve or fifteen students, and it may be deliberate in some policy circles. Chomsky has suggested that the post-Sputnik education emphasis produced a generation of literate and informed students, who promptly terrified the establishment by taking educated stands against it -- and having examined some freshman level college materials from the mid-sixties, in comparison to what was used later when I taught at the college level, I suspect there might be something to that
The problem with Dawkins from my PoV is not his desire that students should be literate in such topics as evolution -- a desire I share -- but his single-minded view that religion is to blame for anti-scientific modes of thought. It is not only an ahistorical view: it also completely ignores the actual social forces that oppose quality scientific education