Academia, Free Speech, Religion, Science

Erskine College Professor Fired For Supporting Science

-Submitted by David Drumm (Nal), Guest Blogger

Erskine College is a small, private, four year Christian liberal arts college located in South Carolina. William Crenshaw, who taught at the college for 35 years, earning tenure, an endowed chair, and teaching awards was fired for his dissent of Erskine’s teaching of science.

Erskine offers a Bachelor of Science degree and is accredited by the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools.

Crenshaw commented:

Science is the litmus test on the validity of the educational enterprise. If a school teaches real science, it’s a pretty safe bet that all other departments are sound. If it teaches bogus science, everything else is suspect…. I want a real college, not one that rejects facts, knowledge, and understanding because they conflict with a narrow religious belief. Any college that lets theology trump fact is not a college; it is an institution of indoctrination. It teaches lies. Colleges do not teach lies. Period.

Erskine College is part of the Associate Reformed Presbyterian Church (ARP) that holds to the infallibility and inerrancy of the Bible. Since the Bible is an inanimate object incapable of fallibility or errancy, this really means  that ARP’s interpretation of the Bible is infallible and inerrant.

ARP is a small denomination with only 250 churches. This number is too small to maintain a faculty and student body of only ARP members. Crenshaw’s firing will send a message to the other 39 faculty members that academic freedom will not be tolerated.

Erskine’s majors include Biology, Natural Science, and Physics. This incident should draw the scrutiny and reevaluation of its accreditation in these areas. The risk of losing its accreditation will do more to discourage potential students than anything Crenshaw said.

A BS degree from Erskine is going to mean diddle squat when applying to a reputable graduate school.

H/T: Inside Higher Ed, Pharyngula.

36 thoughts on “Erskine College Professor Fired For Supporting Science”

  2. I grew up in an all-American neighborhood where kids got their ass kicked for being the wrong kind of Christian. Thought we were making progress during the 60s & 70s to move away from that nonsense. I suppose, in a way, it was progress. But I see now how it has damaged America as each of these crackpot subspecies of “the one true religion” has taken it to mean they can press their particular, peculiar, set of absolute truth and any who disagree are unrepentant heathens worthy to die by fire.

    The good news is if they start killing each other over obscure biblical bullshit soon enough the decent people can start pointing out how insane it all is and maybe hold the insane at bay.

  3. Thanks, Mike.

    I thought it was a good piece for this particular thread. I suspect every one of us has been in that position. Either rant or let your head explode.

  4. “Storm.”

    OS

    Perfect and incredibly entertaining. Thank you for introducing me to Tim Minchin, who from this seems a genius poet.

  8. “The blog added that Crenshaw was “an evangelist of infidelity” and said that he encourages students to question faith with “his secular brain-dribble.”

    OS,

    This to me is the scariest part of the statement. It promotes religious faith as unquestioning belief. The problem is so obvious. Each major religion has many sects, all with differing interpretations of their scripture. The thinking behind this is that one must choose a particular belief system and then exclude all other possibilities from even contemplation. This produces a mindlessness that is both easy to control an open to corruption. From a mindset like this comes all the wars and travails that beset humanity.

  9. “Erskine College is a small, private, four year Christian liberal arts college located in South Carolina. William Crenshaw, who taught at the college for 35 years, earning tenure, an endowed chair, and teaching awards was fired for his dissent of Erskine’s teaching of science.

    Erskine offers a Bachelor of Science degree and is accredited by the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools. Erskine College is part of the Associate Reformed Presbyterian Church (ARP) that holds to the infallibility and inerrancy of the Bible.”

    William Crenshaw was predestined to be fired.

  10. Well OS,

    I suppose the word for them is askance….maybe they are misogynous GOPers….

  11. I found this after a brief search:

    The ARP Talk blog called Crenshaw’s comments on science evidence that he is “functionally an atheist who, in his rabid, secular fundamentalism, preaches his views with as much vigor and determination as an old-time Methodist revivalist of 100 years ago.” The blog added that Crenshaw was “an evangelist of infidelity” and said that he encourages students to question faith with “his secular brain-dribble.”

    Sometimes one hardly knows what to say in the face of concerted ignorance. The late Dr. Laurance Peter once wrote, “Against logic there is no armor like ignorance.”

    http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2011/09/08/english_professor_at_erskine_known_for_defending_science_is_fired

  12. http://www.pcpc.org/ Park Cities Presbyterian is one of these churches. My children knew people that went to this church so I heard quite a bit about the church’s beliefs. Many very affluent people in Dallas adhere to this brand of Presbyterianism. I doubt anyone would be surprised at that.

  13. It may be true that Perry is doing well in SC…But it does not mean that he has paid the filing fee to be on the ballot…

    South Carolina GOP primary fundraising picks up

    Candidates already have put up $160,000 to have their names on the ballot. Perry, Bachmann, Gingrich and former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney haven’t paid the $35,000 fee yet.

    Read more: http://www.thestate.com/2011/09/06/1960922/south-carolina-gop-primary-fundraising.html#ixzz1XYYwYVqT

  15. Never new what the ARP was until a few years ago. I thought Presbyterians were Presbyterians. Probably won’t do much to the rankings since it is a regional southern school. Rick Perry is doing very well in South Carolina.

  16. God Bless or Bless Her Heart is a southern colloquialism for “fuck you” and sounds ever so genteel.I have one thing to say to the governor of SC from another genteel lady from NC, Governor Haley, Bless your heart.

  17. If the school loses or changes its accreditation, credentialing from that school could become less valuable in the marketplace, both for graduate school and perhaps some employers. too. I don’t see a problem with that.

    I wonder what that would do to rankings, which are actually fairly high for this school.

  18. SC gov. calls reporter ‘little girl’ over story

    COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) — South Carolina’s first woman governor called a female reporter a “little girl” over an article detailing at least $127,000 in taxpayer dollars the governor and other state officials spent on a European economic development trip.

    In a syndicated radio talk show interview Thursday, Republican Gov. Nikki Haley was asked about last Sunday’s article by 25-year-old Renee Dudley in The Post and Courier of Charleston: (http://bit.ly/oMjHxE).

    “And all I will tell you is: God bless that little girl at The Post and Courier. I mean her job is to try and create conflict. My job is to create jobs. In the end I’m going to have jobs to show for it,” Haley said on “The Laura Ingraham Show.”

    http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5jZ5ucLdX2QBPFFko9-yKOfYCV5oA?docId=176a0b11b4844369b1e5e11d0969b4f2

  19. In the last 20 years has there really been freedom in teaching….especially at the college level….Publish or Perish became the mantra…..

    Am I surprised at this decision, not at all…I read something about the SC Governor the other day..which seems to fit in the Hypocritical State…

  20. Well, the BS degree will be an accurate term for it, only it won’t be Bachelor of Science, but a more Texas kind, of BS.

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