TEACHING LEGITIMATE SCIENTIFIC CONTROVERSIES TO IMPROVE GEOSCIENCE LEARNING: RELEVANT RESEARCH FINDINGS

Historian of science Stephen G. Brush posed this question in a classic article (1974) published in the journal Science and entitled "Should the history of science be rated X?: The way scientists behave (according to historians) might not be a good model for students." Brush took a position of openness, in contrast to the position of philosopher of science J. C. C. Smart, who "suggested that it is legitimate to use fictionalized history of science to illustrate one's pronouncements on scientific method."

Brush recommended that we show students actual science-in- the-making, not a sanitized version of the real thing. Science is not always conducted cooperatively and in the common pursuit of truth, but instead reflects the culture, society, and biases of the scientists who do the work. Nevertheless, conflicts and errors in science are ultimately revealed and corrected by the scientific community, and thus, scientific knowledge is restructured after new and credible information is available (Duschl 1994).

We present an overview of the literature on best practices, caveats, strategies for teaching legitimate scientific controversy, and a spectrum of possible geological controversies that can be used by geoscience instructors. Such controversy provides the hook for students to see science as a more interesting endeavor (Matthews 1994), helps humanize the geoscience curriculum (Jenkins 1989), teaches important geological concepts by embedding them in the context of their history, and enlightens students about how geoscience ultimately resolves legitimate academic controversies and moves forward.

Rudwick (1985) noted that scientific knowledge is often the product of intense argument among a small group of ambitious researchers. The spectrum of geoscience controversies we have uncovered typifies a mode of "advancement via controversy" that Henry T. De la Beche (1796-1855) advocated long ago. De la Beche was the chief antagonist of Roderick Murchison and Adam Sedgwick in "The Great Devonian Controversy." He even drew scientific caricatures to catalyze debate and to focus the adversarial parties on the central issues upon which an active geological controversy turned! He knew that geology ultimately advances by resolving academic controversies within the scientific community. We think 21st-century students need to understand this.