[Header Photo by Laura Chouette on Unsplash]
Science as a field or method is neither a neutral good nor a neutral bad.
Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein powerfully unpacks the moral complications of science in what many believe is the first work of science fiction (which perceptively and critically interrogated science in its early evolution).
Victor Frankenstein embodies the frailties and very human limitations of science as a human behavior. And The Monster animates the horrifying potential dangers of science conducted by morally weak or bankrupt humans.
Consider first the responsibility inherent in The Creator for The Creature (The Monster):
A rich theme running through Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein is responsibility. In a straightforward—even didactic—way, the novel chronicles the devastating consequences for an inventor and those he loves of his utter failure to anticipate the harm that can result from raw, unchecked scientific curiosity. The novel not only explores the responsibility that Victor Frankenstein has for the destruction caused by his creation but also examines the responsibility he owes to him….
Victor experiences the two basic meanings of the word responsibility. He creates the creature (he causes it to exist), and therefore he has at least some responsibility for what the creature goes on to do. As the creature’s maker, Victor also has both a duty to others to keep them safe from his creation and, Mary seems to be saying, a duty to his creation to ensure that his existence is worthwhile. We will turn to these two ideas now—responsibility for and responsibility to.
Traumatic Responsibility, Josephine Johnston
Next, think about the role of science as simply a tool of the scientist, too easily distracted by their own missionary zeal and hubris, and thus, apt to fail to ground their work in moral and ethical boundaries:
Victor’s crime is not pursuing science but in failing to consider the well-being of others and the consequences of his actions. I contend also that Mary’s great work is a tale not about the dangers of a man’s quest for knowledge but about the ethics of his failure to attempt to anticipate and take responsibility for the results of that quest. There is a strong link between Victor’s failure of empathy for his creature and the particular kind of hubris that allows for the discarding of other people’s lives in service to an ambition. This failure of empathy is closely connected to the moral cowardice of refusing to take responsibility for one’s actions or for the outcomes derived from one’s research….
He undertakes his research in a spirit of self-aggrandizement: it’s not knowledge he seeks but power and renown, and this ambition leads him to become far more of a monster than the creature he creates….
As soon as he achieves his obsession, he rejects the accomplishment, and catastrophe results.
Frankenstein Reframed; or, The Trouble with Prometheus, Elizabeth Bear
Science has a long history of being a veneer for human flaws (sexism and racism masked by IQ as a scientific measure, for example) and being literally weaponized for military conquest (Hiroshima and Nagasaki, for example).
The US has a baffling and often contradictory relationship with science since in one context many will reject solid science (Covid vaccinations) and then embrace another “science” in the unchallenged rhetoric of media and political storytelling (the “science of reading” [SOR] movement).
One scientist at the center of the SOR movement, Mark Seidenberg, not only wrote a book on the cognitive science of reading but also has testified and advocated for state reading legislation grounded in SOR.
Seidenberg now seems poised to retreat from The Monster he helped create like Dr. Frankenstein himself.
Back in 2020, writing with co-authors in Reading Research Quarterly, Seidenberg offered an odd confession considering his advocacy for SOR policy: “Our concern is that although reading science is highly relevant to learning in the classroom setting, it does not yet speak to what to teach, when, how, and for whom at a level that is useful for teachers [emphasis added].” [1]
And now in late 2023 after nearly every state has adopted some form of new or revised SOR-based reading legislation, Seidenberg seems to be in full and eager retreat (even as he continues to cling to misinformation about a reading crisis and garbled blame launched at whole language and balanced literacy); he admits there is “[n]ot enough science in the ‘science of reading,'” in fact.
This talk notes that the SOR movement isn’t the same as reading science and even states that the SOR story is overly simplistic and grounded in outdated research (some may notice that many of us in literacy made these same claims in the very beginning of the SOR movement, but we have been repeatedly attacked and discredited).
Now that SOR has “won” and the accountability shoe is on their foot, SOR advocates are laying the groundwork like Seidenberg to avoid any responsibility (sound familiar?); see this from Emily Hanford for EWA, who announced the role of journalists as “watchdogs” who must police the incompetent field of reading teachers:
Hanford encouraged reporters not to write stories two years from now with a simple narrative of whether science of reading failed [2], if test scores don’t suddenly skyrocket. Changing systems is hard, she said.
Journalists, she said, have control over the narrative.
“Keep your eyes on this one, and don’t let this one go,” Hanford said. “Reporters did, I think, largely turn away from how kids learn to read. And I think that’s part of how we ended up in the situation we’re in now. We get to be the watchdogs. We get to be the ones who can contribute to what happens.”
SOR is essentially the law of the land and drives what schools are adopting and implementing; therefore, all this backpedaling and caution are likely because the preliminary results are not very promising.
England passed sweeping phonics-centric legislation in 2006, but early research and recent PISA outcomes suggest the promises of systematic phonics for all students are misleading stories at best.
Here in the US, a working paper examining SOR policy in California also shows that claims SOR will result in 90% of students achieving reading proficiency is a story we are being sold (that study reveals about 1/3 of students reached proficiency, the same percentage called a crisis by SOR advocates).
SOR advocates have created a monster in the form of misguided and overly prescriptive reading legislation, a monster stitched together from a series of false stories about a reading crisis, reading programs and theories failing children, and reading teachers not knowing reading science. That monster also includes unrealistic promises that will never be met, and thus, SOR will lead to another reading crisis in five or ten years (just as the NCLB/NRP years led to the SOR reading crisis).
SOR advocates are already running, but they can’t hide.
SOR has many Dr. Frankensteins and many Dr. Frankenstein wanna-be-s who have all created monsters in the form of state legislation based on false stories but with “[n]ot enough science in the ‘science of reading.'”
This is their monster—and their responsibility.
[1] Seidenberg, M.S., Cooper Borkenhagen, M., & Kearns, D.M. (2020). Lost in translation? Challenges in connecting reading science and educational practice. Reading Research Quarterly, 55(S1), S119–S130. https://doi.org/10.1002/rrq.341
[2] Please note that Hanford has made a career doing exactly what she warns other journalists not to do—perpetuate a “simple narrative” about reading failure and the blame for that failure.
dr. p.l. (paul) thomas 