Bluegrass Wildlife: The Eclipse of Doubt — many of us wore funny glasses, trusted science


By Howard Whiteman
Murray State University

Just over a month ago, we were all doing it. Millions of us were outside, with funny glasses on, looking at the sun. Many of us drove miles to get inside the totality, where there would be a total solar eclipse. Why? What pushed us, even compelled us to give up a day of work or school to go see this event? Because it was rare, and we knew it.

Total solar eclipses don’t happen very often, and they certainly don’t happen very often in our backyards. We’ve had two in fairly close succession that have covered some of the same areas, so we’ve been lucky. But it will be two decades before the next one is visible within the contiguous United States.

Why are we so sure this is true? Why did we know where to go, and when to be there? Why did so many people make sure they were in the perfect spot, and the exact right time, to see this spectacular event? Because they trusted the science. It was science that has been predicting eclipses and other astronomical events for centuries, and we all know it. It works, every time.

Solar eclipses are predictable just like other scientific knowledge. (Photo by John Hewlett)

We also use science to predict the phases of the moon; sunrise and sunset; ocean tides; meteor showers; where planets can be seen on any night, and even the recent northern lights.

The list goes on and on. We know that it is all true because it works every time.

We didn’t always believe it.

Copernicus was a Polish astronomer that was the first European scientist to propose that the Earth and other planets revolve around the sun. Prior to his work, everyone thought that the Earth was the center of the universe. Copernicus didn’t publish his work until the year of his death (1543), in part because his findings were so controversial to leaders at the time.

Galileo is considered by many as the father of modern science. Galileo’s advocacy of Copernicus’s ideas brought on the ire of authorities in the early 1600s, and he was forced to recant and placed under house arrest for the rest of his life.

But now, we do not question astronomical formulas. We embrace them, get in our cars, pay hundreds of dollars for gas, hotel rooms, and food, all because we know—we know—that the total solar eclipse is going to happen at a certain place and time.

Although we don’t question astronomy anymore, some of us continue to question science, particularly when it goes against long-held views of how the world works. We understand that DNA exists and that it can show us how we are related to each other and ancestors in distant lands.

Indeed, many of us have spent our hard-earned dollars to find out who we are related to, both currently and in the past, by just taking a swab of our inner cheek and sending it off with a credit card number. We even have TV shows that evaluate paternity with absolute certainty, because of our understanding of genetics. We know DNA can link us to a Scottish King or famous actress or can tell us with precision that Mr. Smith is or isn’t the father of a child.

Even so, some balk at the notion that this same DNA can also tell us that we are share 98.8% of our genes with chimpanzees, and that our relationships to other animals fit perfectly within the evolutionary scenario that Darwin predicted, because genetics shows us that all of life on this planet is related to each other. All of it, from blue whales to green algae to bacteria, all of it uses the same DNA, and just like the Scottish King or famous actress, we can determine just how related we are to anything else that lives on planet Earth.

Watching the eclipse (File photo)

Some have no issues with the DNA of Watson, Crick, and Franklin, who discovered the structure of DNA, when it is used in ancestry or paternity or medicine. However, when it challenges who we are as a species and how we came to be that species, well, some quickly turn their backs on science, and we ostracize the seminal works of Darwin and other evolutionary biologists. It’s like the moon of doubt and distrust is covering the sun of knowledge.

It seems as much as things have changed over the centuries, so much has stayed the same. There is no cost to following astronomers now; those in power have no issue with it. Some of them do have issues, at least sometimes, with things like evolution, climate change, and vaccines. They make it so that we have to pick a side with these things, even though science has shown all of them to be true. They also provide cover to those who want to doubt science because of their world view —well so and so doesn’t believe it, so why should I?

In our society, we follow the law and science. Science is like the law — it doesn’t matter what you believe should be the law, it is still there whether we agree with it or not. Or, as the astronomer Neil Degrasse Tyson put it: “The good thing about science is that it is true whether you believe it or not”.

The eclipse gives me confidence that doubts about science will change.

We once believed that the Earth was the center of the universe, and scientists that questioned this dogma were ostracized. Like our understanding of astronomy, we will grow to embrace our understanding of current science, the knowledge of which will brighten our days just like the sun emerging after the very predictable darkness of a solar eclipse.

Dr. Howard Whiteman is a professor in the Department of Biological Sciences at Murray State University and holds the Commonwealth Endowed Chair of Environmental Studies.


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