Yes, I think Bill's quandary belongs mostly to the philosophy of science,
which was where I felt the urge to soothe some worries. I have no problem
with letting kids in the schools study science in a way that makes them
trust the World to be there while they sleep at night.
Then what is taught as a topic, and what is the fundamental worldview
implied in curriculum and teaching is not necessarily the same. I'm not a
curriculum theorist in sience teaching, but I would certaily be much
happier with a curriculum consistently founded on an ecological paradigm
(of responsibility towards the World rather than mastery of it) than with
the techno-romantic white-coat science that was the ideal of text-book
writers in my own school days.
Eva