Florida Senator Marco Rubio has attracted a lot of unwelcome attention by equivocating in response to a question regarding the age of the earth:
I’m not a scientist, man. I can tell you what recorded history says, I can tell you what the Bible says, but I think that’s a dispute amongst theologians and I think it has nothing to do with the gross domestic product or economic growth of the United States. I think the age of the universe has zero to do with how our economy is going to grow. I’m not a scientist. I don’t think I’m qualified to answer a question like that. At the end of the day, I think there are multiple theories out there on how the universe was created and I think this is a country where people should have the opportunity to teach them all. I think parents should be able to teach their kids what their faith says, what science says. Whether the Earth was created in 7 days, or 7 actual eras, I’m not sure we’ll ever be able to answer that. It’s one of the great mysteries.
A liberal friend messaged me on Facebook that this sort of the thing is ”why [he] can’t be a Republican.” Well, he has plenty of other reasons, but that’s neither here nor there.
My first response was to compare Senator Rubio’s evasiveness to Barack Obama’s inartful dodging in response to a relatively straightforward question from Rick Warren:
WARREN: Now, let’s deal with abortion; 40 million abortions since Roe v. Wade. As a pastor, I have to deal with this all of the time, all of the pain and all of the conflicts. I know this is a very complex issue. Forty million abortions, at what point does a baby get human rights, in your view?
OBAMA: Well, you know, I think that whether you’re looking at it from a theological perspective or a scientific perspective, answering that question with specificity, you know, is above my pay grade.
Of course, we all know what the President has to believe to take the position he does, and that it’s one that has nothing to do with the authority of science. I’m less certain of what Senator Rubio believes; what is clear is that he doesn’t want to offend or alienate young earth creationists.
Peter Wehner takes him to the woodshed for his remarks:
One of the attributes of conservatism, at least as I understand it, is openness to evidence, including scientific evidence, and embracing reality. It can be discrediting to a political party—as well as religious institutions—to stand against (or deny) overwhelming empirical evidence on any subject.
I wish I could say that I can’t improve upon these comments, but I think I can, albeit at the margins. It is of course true that in our culture science has enormous authority, in large measure because of the explanatory power of many of its theories and the great benefits that come from its practical applications. But I would continue to insist upon the difference between science and scientism, which is to say, upon the limits of science. If and when advocates of science assert that the scientific method is the key to all knowledge, that nothing is knowable except by means of that method, we have good reasons to object. Some of our most important questions aren’t susceptible to merely scientific answers. (Try, for example, to explain personhood or rights in merely scientific terms.)
I’m all for encouraging Senator Rubio to add some nuance (of a different sort) when confronted with a question clearly intended to contribute to a caricature of him. But let’s not cede too much ground to the advocates of scientism, who would have us believe that what science can explain or reproduce is all there is.
November 20th, 2012 | 10:33 am
Does the age of the Earth or the creation of the Universe or the biological origin of the human species really make that much difference in the day-to-day life of the average American? Probably not. But I DO expect our elected officials to live in the REAL world, rather than subscribing to a lot of superstitious nonsense.
Marco Rubio was not asked, “How old is the Earth?” He was asked, “How old do you think the Earth is?” Surely he has an belief, based either on science of theology, but instead he chose to dance away from the question. I find that dismaying. If we take “Young Earth” creationism at face value, EVERYTHING we know about physics and astronomy and even higher mathematics completely falls apart.
During his campaign Mitt Romney lamented how science education was lagging behind the rest of the Western industrialized world. Considering how 46% percent of Americans believe in the creationist view that God created humans in their present form at one time within the last 10,000 years, Romney certainly would have had his work cut out for him if he had been elected.
Let’s face it: “Young Earth” creationism is the antithesis of science. It completely inverts the scientific method, starting with an assumption (i.e. “God did it.”), then contorting science to fit that assumption, and if scientific facts do not support the notion that “God did it,” those facts can be dismissed as nothing less than an elaborate Satanic deception. I expect fundamentalist Christian preachers to spew this kind of gobbledygook, but not members of the House Science Committee and CERTAINLY not up-and-coming Presidential prospects.
November 20th, 2012 | 10:34 am
“At what point does a baby get human rights?” is a very different question than “What is the age of the earth?” The question of when a “baby” gets human rights is not an empirical matter. The age of the earth is not a matter of religious faith. It’s a matter of empirical science. No rational person of faith should fear the answers that science is truly capable of providing, and the age of the earth is one of those questions. The Catholic Church in the 21st century has no problem acknowledging that there are matter of science and matters of faith, and the two cannot be in conflict.
As an aside, McCain’s answer to when a “baby” gets human rights was, “At the moment of conception.” However, he supported funding for stem-cell research and said abortion should be permitted in the case of rape, incest, and threat to the life of the mother. McCain’s crowd-pleasing answer to Rick Warren’s question was not consistent with his own position on abortion. Obama’s answer to the question was ill-considered, but McCain’s was substantively worse.
November 20th, 2012 | 11:15 am
Chuck has the wrong assumption on YEC. They assume the Bible provides an accurate time line. Assumption of a God says nothing about how old the earth is.
November 20th, 2012 | 11:45 am
“McCain’s crowd-pleasing answer to Rick Warren’s question was not consistent with his own position on abortion. Obama’s answer to the question was ill-considered, but McCain’s was substantively worse.”
On the former, at least, I am in full agreement with you, David.
Yet McCain gave a straightforward answer that happened to be quite inconsistent with other positions he has taken. Then-Senator Obama punted entirely, and in a disingenuous fashion.
The constituencies each man were trying hard to please (or not to offend) are obvious enough. Almost as obvious are the true sentiments of each man. For Obama, given the length and breadth of his long record, the fetus is an object of moral indifference, if not inconvenience, and often an outright threat; for McCain, the fetus is not quite human, but something which seems to generate some bouts of moral discomfort which he prefers to avoid or finesse wherever possible.
““At what point does a baby get human rights?” is a very different question than “What is the age of the earth?””
Quite correct: the former is strictly a moral question, which may have legal ramifications. If politician cannot speak on what he thinks is right or wrong – an activity for which he ought to be supremely suited – one wonders what good he is at all.
November 20th, 2012 | 11:50 am
I expect my officials to not believe superstitious nonsense too. I expect them to refrain from thinking “hope” and “change” are magic spells. But I don’t care how old they think the world is even if it is “science”.
November 20th, 2012 | 11:54 am
David, I know the question is Warren’s, and not yours, but I have to say I find the question itself–”At what point does a baby get human rights”–pretty repulsive, besides being something on the order of a non-sequitor.
Human rights by definition are things that adhere to the simple condition of being human; they are not conferred or earned in any ordinary sense. One cannot “get” them, as the question asserts. Quite apart from their application to the abortion issue, Warren’s question seriously misunderstands and misstates the whole idea of human rights.
I don’t know whether to be surprised or not by Warren’s clumsiness here. But the only way the question would make rational sense would be to interpret it as an oblique way of asking, “When does a baby (or unborn baby) become human?” That is a more empirical question than the “rights” one, and although obviously there are arguments to be made on both sides, the preponderance of truly empirical data–evidence from genetics and evolution, as well as from medical technology, as opposed to from flights of speculation on “what it really means to be human” (e.g.)–seems to favor the “conception” conclusion. Senator McCain’s shallow understanding notwithstanding.
Another empirical way of framing Warren’s original question might have been to ask: “What distinguishes the human-rights-holding baby from its non-human-rights-holding predecessor?” There one could argue on the basis of functionality, consciousness, reaction to external stimuli, etc.–real events and capacities that can be investigated. (For the record, I’m saying that one COULD argue this way, not that I find that line persuasive.)
But I have not found that the pro-choice crowd welcomes such an empirical approach to the matter, perhaps because they see that it would set a baseline for permissible and impermissible abortions, as against the general liscense they now enjoy.
November 20th, 2012 | 11:55 am
But this case isn’t about “nothing is knowable except by means of” science. This is about whether the age of the Earth is knowable by means of science.
That seems like something well within science’s purview. Am I guilty of scientism for claiming that?
(And perhaps I’m compounding my scientism, but it seems entirely fair to ask someone who’s on the Senate Commerce, Science, and Transportation Committee a question relevant to an active social and political controversy about science.)
November 20th, 2012 | 12:52 pm
Then-Senator Obama’s evasion introduced science where some might argue it doesn’t belong, as if science could tell help us distinguish between rights-bearers and non-rights-bearers.
In its own way, it’s just as bad an answer as that offered by Senator Rubio.
And I stand behind my insistence that the benefits we derive from science ought not to blind us to its limitations. Our current president isn’t perhaps as alive to this problem as I’d like.
November 20th, 2012 | 2:24 pm
And I stand behind my insistence that the benefits we derive from science ought not to blind us to its limitations.
Joseph Knippenberg,
Aren’t you, somewhat like Rubio, evading the issue at hand? Of course we ought not be blind to the limitations of science. That doesn’t mean we can’t say the earth is 4.54 billion years old. Both you and R. R. Reno feel Rubio gave a bad answer to the question, but neither of you has said so far what a good answer would be. And was Rubio actually making your point, or just trying to evade answering the question?
Science has its limitations, but it also has its strengths, and when the question is the physical age of the earth, it is not “scientism” to look to science for the answer.
November 20th, 2012 | 3:04 pm
as if science could tell help us distinguish between rights-bearers and non-rights-bearers
But even staunch pro-lifers insist that science can help tell us. They insist that a fertilized egg or zygote contains in its DNA all the instructions for a new human being and therefore is a new human being. Where did that information come from. Many times when the concept of quickening is brought up, pro-lifers point out that there may have been uncertainty in the past as to when a person existed, but modern embryology has clarified that life begins at conception. In several discussions recently here and elsewhere, pro-lifers have told me to check out what embryology textbooks say. In many ways, the pro-life argument relies more heavily on science than the pro-choice (or pro-abortion) arguments do.
If Obama had used some other metaphor than “above my pay grade” (which I acknowledge was an abomination), his answer would have been at least as acceptable as McCain’s (though not as popular). McCain’s position was untenable. “Babies” possess human rights from the moment of conception, however, we may violate their right to life if they resulted from rape or incest, or if we want to harvest their stem cells.
November 20th, 2012 | 3:44 pm
David, A quibble. I suspect Joseph Knippenberg would gladly use science to determine whether of not a certain entity was human or not. That isn’t a determination of rights-bearing. That question is whether humans should bear rights. It has nothing to do with science. Having determined that humans bear rights — for example life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness — science helps decide who is human.
November 21st, 2012 | 3:03 pm
It is time for YECs and other unbiblical Christians to get over it and admit that the first two verses of the Bible, do exist.
http://textsincontext.wordpress.com/2012/05/03/in-the-beginning/
November 21st, 2012 | 4:00 pm
I can’t help but think the whole YEC controversy is contrived. I have met people who have come to believe that Evolution must be wrong due to the way evolution “absolutists” denigrate religion. If similar old-earth “absolutists” get established, the same reaction will set in for others. Explain and persuade. Don’t hound. Otherwise, we give science a bad name and, no doubt, start substituting our own beliefs for “science”.
November 23rd, 2012 | 1:57 pm
[...] Marco Rubio and Science – Joseph Knippenberg, First Thoughts [...]
November 23rd, 2012 | 2:49 pm
I invite anyone overawed by the power of science to read Paul Feyerabend’s dismantling of “the scientific method,” and of science taking “the path of least resistance.”
November 23rd, 2012 | 9:56 pm
Almost every matter of history, we typically accept based on faith in other human beings. The same is true of science. How many scientific experiments have you performed where you took nothing on faith in others? This would include your having built from scratch or verified every detail of the instrumentation used as well as having experimentally verified all the scientific principles upon which the instrumentation was based. One’s knowledge of both history and science is founded, not on personal experience, but on faith in the testimony of others. No matter how well founded that faith may be, it is faith.
Admittedly, Marco Rubio should not have hedged on his faith in scientists regarding the age of the earth rather than to say what seemed politically convenient. He was right to point out that the scientific question is economically irrelevant.
Of course, some things scientists say are obviously erroneous. A good example is Richard Dawkins’ claim that his metaphor of a multiple-dial lock illustrates an increase in the probability of evolutionary success of natural selection. It does not. It illustrates an increase in the efficiency of random mutation. In his failure to understand the distinction between efficiency and probability, Dawkins demonstrates his lack of understanding of the Darwinian algorithm he is attempting to explain (pages 121-122, “The God Delusion”). In this case, the layman can rely on his personal knowledge of high school arithmetic and the Darwinian algorithm to avoid false faith in a scientist.
November 24th, 2012 | 9:45 am
Bob Drury –
There’s such a thing as rational trust, and irrational mistrust, though.
Tell that to petroleum geologists. A topic relevant to someone who sits on the Senate Commerce, Science, and Technology Committee.
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