Professor Jerry Coyne: Promised debate at Auckland University on indigenous ways of knowing vs. science fails to materialize

In 2021, the Listener Letter fracas erupted in New Zealand when seven professors at Auckland University argued that the indigenous “way of knowing,” Mātauranga Māori (MM), while valuable in anthropology and sociology classes, should not be taught, as the government planned, as coequal with modern science. The seven signers were right: while MM does contain some empirical knowledge obtained by trial and error, it’s also a mixture of that empiricism with religion, spirituality, morality, teleology, legends from word of mouth, and guidelines for proper behavior. That stuff doesn’t belong in science class, but they keep trying to sneak it in anyway.