Posted on 08/10/2005 8:49:11 AM PDT by PatrickHenry
It's probably being financed by Korea.
Remember...Hitler and Stalin hated spaghetti.
YES friend. May all the unbelievers meet their fate in a pit of fiery tomato sauce!!!! (with a little basil and oregano thrown in for good measure)
Don't worry. The US will always need ditch-diggers and burger flippers.
But Mussolini loved it. And Tojo enjoyed Ramen...
Mommy! Mommy! They disagree with me. They're, they're, stoooopid! Make them stop Mommy, make them stop.
Good reply...
Go "nuts"? The only "nuts" I see here are the ones who deny evidence and insist that their falsehoods are somehow factually equivalent or superior to scientific work.
You're saying that the good science will stand, but when scientists defend it you accuse them of being "nuts." Should they simply ignore the lies?
If it's good science, it will stand and other views/theories are no threat to it. Once again, even with all the evidence, much of which can still only give them best-guess type information, the evolution thories do not warrant being taught as absolutes and to preclude all other theories. No matter how much you wish to discount the possibility of an all-powerful God, what these scientists put on the table is not enough to say they are 100% correct and no other theory needs to be looked at. If you do research, you will find just as many, if not more lies coming from the scientific community because they are only human and incapable of putting their own belief system into the equation. Not to say many aren't as honest and objective as they can be, but there are many creationists that also have integrity - you seem to doubt that and it is to your own detriment as a supporter of science. Look at political parties and how they express themselves - the President stays calm in the face of lies about him because he knows the truth. Democrats lie and howl and attack anyone who doesn't agree with them because they know they are not being 100% honest, objective and up-front.
I repeat, with what is at stake for the scientists if they happen to be wrong (information that doesn't have a lot of practical value when it comes down to making things better for the Human race), throwing a hissy because others disagree and would have a tether put on a so-far unprovable theory, they do go nuts. Your response (Should they simply ignore the lies?), is a perfect example. How can you call something a lie if you can't unequivically state the absolute truth?
Have a great day.
Please present a scientific theory which you imagine does meet YOUR criteria for science. I assure you that scientists don't hold theories to the same criteria you do. For example, there are NO scientific theories that are ever proven. A contrary piece of evidence could be found at any time, leading to the abandonment of the theory. However, theories are provisionally accepted until such time as this evidence is actually seen. As far as meeting the "scientific test of experimentation" goes, I will submit that there are a lot of scientific theories that fail this test, if you mean what I think you mean by it. In fact, pretty much the whole field of astrophysics would fail this test. After all, who has actually done an experiment in which the stellar life cycle has been observed, just to give one example?
I will submit that your test of what is and isn't science is flawed. The real criterion is that an idea must be falsifiable to be scientific. That is, there must be some potential observation that would lead to the conclusion that the theory is false. For evolution, such potential observations abound. For example, finding out that there's a large number of species that don't have DNA for a genetic material would indicate that these organisms do not share a common ancestor with the rest, finding a mammalian fossil reliably dated to over 1 billion years old would lead to the conclusion that our evolutionary model is wrong, or finding a viral DNA insertion in gorillas and chimpanzees but not in humans would lead to abandonment of the current model of primate evolution. All the pieces of the theory of evolution are similarly falsifiable, so the theory is scientific. Undoubtedly, new evidence will arise that will lead to the modification of the theory, but that's how science works. Nothing is ever set in stone in science, and as I mentioned, nothing is ever proven.
Lies are always a threat to truth, because they are frequently more appealing than the truth. Lies must be stomped out wherever they are found.
Would you let lies about your life's work stand unchallenged?
True. Let the challenges come in be peer-reviewed by professionals, be written up in science journals, further be reviewed by the science community and compared to standing theories and then find their way into basic level textbooks and classrooms. That is the appropriate forum for scientific debate and change, not the political arena.
At this point in time, the peer-reviewed journals & literature support evolutionary theory overwhelmingly and have not been seriously challenged.
Would you let lies about your life's work stand unchallenged?
First, they have to be provable lies. second, they have to really matter. If you can't prove it, and if it won't make a real difference to run after it, it makes no sense to get upset about it. The "life's work" comment is telling, it makes things personal instead of objective.
At this point in time, the peer-reviewed journals & literature support evolutionary theory overwhelmingly and have not been seriously challenged.
I admit there is a preponderance of support for evolution, but there have also been numerous published, peer-reviewed articles in scientific journals that question evolution to one degree or another. being in a majority may be comforting, but it is not necessarily an indication that one is right, or that anyone in the minority is wrong.
Here is a short, but interesting article about The Myth of Falsibility which explains that science doesn't always follow its own rules and is not above modifying thought trains to keep a theory alive.
The life's work isn't mine, so your over-reaching doesn't hold. I'm as objective as anyone else.
The lies can be proved wrong, and have been thoroughly debunked. But even reminding of that fact results in hysterical shrieking from the liars' defenders and accusations of "censorship."
I am aware of only one:
Meyer, Stephen C. 2004. The origin of biological information and the higher taxonomic categories. Proceedings of the Biological Society of Washington 117(2):213-239.
and this was only in a minor peer-reviewed taxonomic journal in the Northwest U.S.; it never made it any form to any of the more major journals due to various faulty assumptions and errors revealed upon closer scrutiny (i.e. it made it past the first tier of review, but not to any higher levels). Kudos to Meyer for trying, though; this is what the scientific method is about. Most opponents of mainstream evolutionary theory circumvent the whole process through either using political processes or starting their own fringe journals outside of the mainstream review process - this is what angers scientists, not serious legitimate challenges to theories. As of now, this one paper is still a tiny speck amidst the thousands of published papers that provide support for the mainstream theory.
Your link was an interesting read, though I was disappointed that it distorted the significance of Gould's punctuated equilibrium hypothesis (another issue of it own). The fossil record may(?) reveal that the fossil record shows that evolution didn't proceed at a constant, steady pace, but still strongly supports evolution over long stretches of time; contention of that point hasn't been warranted by the evidence - and in any case, investigation of this point is still in its relatively early stages.
Imperfect as peer review may be as a process (as all processes that involve humans are), do you know of any better method for the determination of what constitutes good science that doesn't constitute mob rule?
Thank you for your well thought-out & honest reply.
Darwinian evolution predicted the discovery of large numbers of intermediate forms, missing links, in the fossil record, none of which had been found in Darwin’s time. With a few exceptions the fossil record continues to show long periods of stasis, the sudden disappearance, and the sudden appearance of species. The missing links remain missing. Most scientists have not discarded evolution. Indeed the prominent popularizer of evolution Stephen Jay Gould proposed punctuated equilibrium in which evolution conveniently occurs very quickly in small isolated populations that rarely leave a record as fossils to reconcile evolution with the fossil record. The absence of evidence for evolution becomes evidence of evolution. The core assumption that complex organisms are the product of random variation and natural selection is preserved by altering less important details of the theory.
The first sentence is true. It should be noted, however, that missing links have indeed been found. I’m sure if you ask Vade Retro, he’ll be happy to post his collection of skull photographs. In addition, we have a much clearer picture of the fossil record that we had in Darwin’s time, and nothing whatever that has been discovered since Darwin has cast doubt on the theory.
McGowan’s statement at the end of his last sentence is key: “less important details” a theory -- any theory -- do get altered. I believe the process is known as “science.” As in, “when the theory doesn’t fit the evidence, change the theory.” Why would you expect the theory of evolution to remain unchanged since 1859? No scientific theory is static. And the theory of evolution doesn’t stand or fall on whether evolution was constant and gradual, or whether it moved in fits and starts.
On the other hand, if someone comes up with that Precambrian rabbit fossil, the theory of evolution has some splainin’ to do. It is falsifiable.
McGowan’s assertion that “the missing links remain missing” is a serious distortion of the facts. Many intermediate forms have been found since 1859, falsifying, to a certain extent, his statement and leaving what remains of it pointless and silly. Every time we find a form between an earlier one and a later one, the very existence of the intermediate form creates two previously unknown“missing links,” between the newly discovered form and its predecessor and descendent forms.
McGowan’s sly, “the absence of evidence for evolution becomes evidence of evolution,” is wrong in every possible way. Evolution doesn’t suffer from an “absence of evidence” in the fossil record. There is abundant evidence for it and no counter-evidence. Further, the fossil record is only part of the picture; there is massive evidence from other disciplines as well, and it all points in the same direction: evolution happened. (Pope John Paul II mentioned it in his remarks on the theory of evolution and Roman Catholic doctrine).
Vade has done excellent work, but my handy links are to Ichneumon:
Ichneumon's legendary post 52. More evidence than you can handle.
Post 661: Ichneumon's stunning post on transitionals.
Good work.
It looks like it died while dancing.
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