Teaching Evolution with the Aid of Science Fiction

In the blockbuster X-Men films, mutant people with telepathy, the ability to control the weather, or amazing healing powers consider themselves "the next step in human evolution. " In Jurassic Park, DNA recovered from a mosquito embedded in amber is used to recreate the dinosaur it came from. Everyone knows these are fictional stories, but do students understand where science leaves off and fiction begins? In this article I recommend using science fiction to confront their misconceptions about biology and encourage higher-level thinking (application, evaluation) about some of the more complicated issues in evolutionary theory. Using science fiction to teach evolutionary biology has several major benefits. First, it provides an engaging medium for exploring concepts that are difficult because they are abstract. Important aspects of the theory are often fairly subtle, such as the facts that not all mutations are deleterious; that evolutionary change is seen in populations, not individuals; and that organisms may not be perfectly adapted to their environment. Science fiction frequently contains errors, while many students accept the printed word as truth. They must be made aware that evolutionary biologists studying real organisms require hard evidence and falsifiable hypotheses. Once provided with correct background information and a working knowledge of the scientific method, students can discover and correct misconceptions through critical reading and discussions. Second, science fiction provides many illustrations of evolution. Despite creationists' claims, real case studies and examples of evolution abound (e.g., Zimmer, 2001). However, such examples may preclude extensive discussion by students because of the difficulty of attendant concepts such as molecular genetics. Fictitious examples provide entertaining and easy-to-understand scenarios, but ones into which students may delve deeply and thus discover much. Perhaps Gould (1996) said it best: Because of the strict limitations placed on scientific writing, "fiction can often provide a truer and deeper account of empirical subjects than genres supposedly dedicated to factual accounting. " Instructors may create fictional examples themselves, or borrow them, as I suggest here, from literary works or from TV and movies that are part of popular culture. Third, science fictional examples of evolution may be used in an active-learning format to spur true scientific thinking (application, analysis, synthesis, evaluation) and help students solidify their knowledge and comprehension of the material (Bonwell & Eisen, 1991). The instructor can ask them to analyze whether speciation has occurred in a particular story, and if so, what reproductive isolating mechanisms have evolved; to distinguish Lamarckian versus Darwinian thinking in an author's writing (for example, by analyzing Spiderman's acquisition of powers from a spider bite); to observe how natural selection has led to adaptation and how drift has caused random changes in a given population. All these activities improve understanding of difficult concepts. By its very nature, science fiction is interdisciplinary. A large part of the field is devoted to issues such as what it means to be human, the nature of good and evil, or race and gender relations (for examples, see The Island of Dr. Moreau, The Left Hand of Darkness, X-Men). Thus, a fourth benefit of teaching with this medium is the opportunity to show how science influences creative writing, drawing, philosophy, history, and other disciplines. Since the characters and themes like those in X-Men and Jurassic Park are already part of popular culture, a fifth benefit of using fiction to teach serious science is that it may win over students who, for religious or other reasons, have little interest in evolution. How To Use Science Fiction Sci fi stories and films can be used in a variety of ways in the classroom. …