Well, I have a college degree in it...does that count?
But in any case, you don't have to be an astronomer to know that "the age of the universe" falls into the category of "fact" and not "theory". And you don't have to be a scientist to know that facts, as far as they pertain to science, can be wrong.
As for whether theories change, often they do, but that doesn't in any way address the point that you were attempting to refute.
However, there are many scientists today who would like you to believe that theories are laws. They are not.
Codswallop. Scientists know the difference, even if you don't. The fact that theories can change and laws can't makes theories stronger than laws, and far more important to science. Theories are conceptual models; laws are empirical rules of thumb. If a theory is wrong, it is either discarded or modified; if a law is wrong (e.g. Ampere's Law), it remains wrong.
I would suggest what you find wrong with this author is his statement that theories can change-not his views on astronomy.
Your theory is wrong. Change it.
I'm not saying theories are not important. I'm saying they can, and have been at times, disproved.
From Wikipedia:
In a standard application of the psychological principle of confirmation bias, scientific research which supports the existing scientific consensus is usually more favorably received than research which contradicts the existing consensus. In some cases, those who question the current paradigm are at times heavily criticized for their assessments. Research which questions a well supported scientific theory is usually more closely scrutinized in order to assess whether it is well researched and carefully documented. This caution and careful scrutiny is used to ensure that science is protected from a premature divergence away from ideas supported by extensive research and toward new ideas which have yet to stand the testing by extensive research. However, this often results in conflict between the supporters of new ideas and supporters of more dominant ideas, both in cases where the new idea is later accepted and in cases where it is later abandoned. Thomas Kuhn in his 1962 book The Structure of Scientific Revolutions discussed this problem in detail.
Several examples of this are present in the relatively recent history of science. For example:
- the theory of symbiogenesis presented by Lynn Margulis and initially rejected by biologists but now generally accepted.
- the theory of punctuated equilibria proposed by Stephen Jay Gould and Niles Eldredge which is still debated but becoming more accepted in evolutionary theory.
- the theory of prions -proteinaceous infectious particles causing transmissible spongiform encephalopathy diseases- proposed by Stanley B. Prusiner and at first rejected because pathogenicity was believed to depend on nucleic acids now widely accepted due to accumulating evidence.
- the theory of heliobacter pylori as the cause of stomach ulcers. This theory was first postulated in 1982 by Barry Marshall and Robin Warren however it was widely rejected by the medical community believing that no bacterium could survive for long in the acidic environment of the stomach. Marshall demonstrated his findings by drinking a brew of the bacteria and consequently developing ulcers. In 2005, Warren and Marshall were awarded the Nobel Prize in Medicine for their work on H. pylori