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To: TalonDJ
This sort of thing is one reason why many science types get all bent out of shape over intelligent design. They are to busy looking at the particulars of life and, not finding anything supernatural, concluding there is none.

In that vein, you might be interested in reading Thomas Kuhn's "The Structure of Scientific Revolutions." He wore out the word paradigm for me - and I'll never forgive him for that - but he's been my guiding philosophy for not getting mired down in the whole crevo-id debates and missing neutrino debates and 'what-killed-the-dinosaurs' debates.

He argues that scientific revolutions are the ruptures of paradigms and the establishment of new ones where the paradigm is a framework of rules governing the universe. The framework is fleshed out with examples of how the system of rules works to make predictions and explain phenomena. Think how Galileo disproved Aristotle, how Newton built on Galileo but was supplanted by Einstein.

Revolutions and new systems of thinking.

The other key part of Kuhn is that there is no way to objectively judge the 'correctness' of a paradigm from within in. You need an objective frame of reference to compare between two paradigms or you need to destroy the paradigm and build a new one.

So in my mind, it is entirely possible that every law of physics (all sciences are physics once reduced down far enough) we currently cling to could be *wrong.* We could have a scientific revolution that changes *everything.* Call me gnostic, but it allows me to be smug and not get uptight over silly arguments.

5,355 posted on 08/10/2005 5:44:33 AM PDT by Lil'freeper
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To: Lil'freeper
We could have a scientific revolution that changes *everything.*

Considering we don't even REALLY know what gravity is I consider it highly likely we will have such a revolution. My guess is it will be inside of 50 years and probably much less. Thanks for the recomendation. Might have to dig that one up.
5,357 posted on 08/10/2005 6:26:32 AM PDT by TalonDJ
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To: Lil'freeper

Yeah, I'm looking forward to seeing some discombobulated scientists one of these days.

Or not; the problem with science is that it's done by people. When you spend your whole career talking about stuff from within a paradigm, it's much easier to say someone who suggests something new is wrong than to actually look at the evidence.


5,358 posted on 08/10/2005 7:00:41 AM PDT by JenB (Go and catch a falling star...)
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