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To: Coyoteman; Sun
Coyote, truly what are a species, but mans description of a thing?

Life/Life-forms were and are, before and beyond, and with /without our categories of them.

Coyote, How does one infer fact (as to reality) and simultaneously deny proof (to science) simultaneously?redundant for emphasis

As to the charts that are posted and ‘the evidence’ that is behind the charts.

Each point in those charts are a snapshot of man’s work/and his individual search for the unknown?)

Wolf
1,342 posted on 04/09/2006 11:37:16 PM PDT by RunningWolf
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To: RunningWolf
"...truly what are a species, but mans description of a thing?"

Species describes a real biological population. It is not just a construct. If two organisms cannot breed, they cannot be the same species.

" Life/Life-forms were and are, before and beyond, and with /without our categories of them."

And yet a polar bear will not breed with a penguin. Nor will a penguin breed with an albatross. There is a genetic/and or behavioral wall between them.

" How does one infer fact (as to reality) and simultaneously deny proof (to science) simultaneously?redundant for emphasis"

Facts about the physical world are also not proved. Both facts and theories can be revised in light of new observations. What is important is evidence, and how much you have of it. Just because one can't know with 100% certainty that something in science is correct does not mean that you can't gather enough data to make a very accurate claim with a high degree of confidence.

This should not be confused with the claim that there IS no absolute, objective reality independent of an observer. There is. What is less than perfect is our ability to understand this reality. This isn't a problem in abstract fields like mathematics where the premises can be defined exactly and where proof can be had. When it comes to understanding the physical universe, there is simply no way to completely eliminate uncertainty.

This doesn't mean we can't (we do) draw conclusions about the world nonetheless; we have to in order to function. For a great many things we can have a tremendous degree of confidence in our decisions. If I am walking down a hallway, I make an subconscious determination of the dimensions of this hallway based on my visual observations. I know that it is possible, theoretically, that my sight is being deceived, or that my mind is playing tricks on me. I have learned through experience though that the probability of this is next to zero. So I walk confidently even with less than 100% proof that the hallway's dimensions are what they appear to be. I take it as a fact that the hallway is so long and so wide. These *facts* are conditional on my not discovering I have been deceived. Facts about the physical world are not proved.

This is what people have to do in science too. Life in general is about learning how to cope with less than 100% certainty.
1,343 posted on 04/10/2006 4:35:05 AM PDT by CarolinaGuitarman ("There is grandeur in this view of life....")
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