Posted on 10/25/2007 6:44:46 PM PDT by neverdem
In January 1955, Homer Jacobson, a chemistry professor at Brooklyn College, published a paper called “Information, Reproduction and the Origin of Life” in American Scientist, the journal of Sigma Xi, the scientific honor society.
In it, Dr. Jacobson speculated on the chemical qualities of earth in Hadean time, billions of years ago when the planet was beginning to cool down to the point where, as Dr. Jacobson put it, “one could imagine a few hardy compounds could survive.”...
Nobody paid much attention to the paper at the time, he said in a telephone interview from his home in Tarrytown, N.Y. But today it is winning Dr. Jacobson acclaim that he does not want — from creationists who cite it as proof that life could not have emerged on earth without divine intervention.
So after 52 years, he has retracted it.
The retraction came about when, on a whim, Dr. Jacobson ran a search for his name on Google. At age 84 and after 20 years of retirement, “I wanted to see, what have I done in all these many years?” he said. “It was vanity. What can I tell you?”
He found many entries relating to his work on compounds called polymers; on information theory, a branch of mathematics involving statistics and probability; and other subjects. But others were for creationist sites that have taken up his 1955 paper as scientific support for their views.
Darwinismrefuted.com, for example, says Dr. Jacobson’s paper “undermines the scenario that life could have come about by accident.” Another creationist site, Evolution-facts.org, says his findings mean that “within a few minutes, all the various parts of the living organism had to make themselves out of sloshing water,” an impossible feat without a supernatural hand.
“Ouch,” Dr. Jacobson said. “It was hideous.”
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
The Bell Curve still stands published, so no.
“Creationists thought they had a magic bullet, but the author retracted his paper and they are left holding the bag!”
Him retracting it doesn’t change anything and there is no bag. Only the one that the evo-religion people have over their heads.
Retracting a paper because its being used to support a belief the author doesn’t support is childish. It points to either his paper was wrong or his belief is wrong. Which one is it?
“Research? But that’s hard work! (Let’s go the mall instead.)”
Yeah its such hard work that it took him 50 plus years to realize what his paper really meant and the shock was too great.
Belief is more suited to religion than science. Science works from facts and theories.
Or, as Heinlein wrote,
Belief gets in the way of learning.Robert A. Heinlein, Time Enough for Love, 1973
GOD created evolution,,then Man,,HE also created science,,wonder if HE could really do that..
it makes him look like a spineless, politically motivated coward.
Wonder if that's what he is.
“Either way, they are both beliefs! Beliefs require faith.”
Then there is evidence.
You don’t need evidence to hold a belief, but if you have evidence to back it up, you will be more likely to be right.
“Evolutionism is a religion. You have to believe/have faith in an unproveable theory.”
hmmm. Is evolution ‘falsifiable’? ie could it be proven wrong? If so, and if there is evidence taht
did I mention a fundamentalist, atheistic zealot?
And this bigoted clown wishes to be called a scientist?
He gets the evoluny of the month for October.
Nothing to argue with there either.
How about you post on religion, I'll post on science?
“I wonder if any science papers get yanked because some whacked-out skinhead web site uses them as proof of race supremacy?”
The science on the racial differences wrt intelligence has already been pretty heavily self-censored.
Just look at what the “Bell Curve” book went through.
I guess the implication of that is a bit disturbing. If someone proved that life on earth was impossible to sponaneously emerge, would it be cast aside as unscientific? OTOH, if a paper cmae out that theorizes how it could emerge thusly, that would surely be a lauded scientific result. There is a bias even before any non-scientist gets involved.
Did Newton's belief in the Lord and Alchemy get in the way of his learning?
Did Father Lemaitre's belief in the Lord get in the way of his learning?
I could go on but there's no pint. You and Heinlein are both demonstrably wrong.
LOL!
It is science..Pure Theory,,you’re right,,don’t fret none.
Just my thought,nothing more.
Sorry to hear that. Hope things improve over there.
“The worst reason to retract a peer-reviewed, published paper would be that you didn’t like the ideological implications that were inferred by honest work.”
I agree.
If he has an issue with how he is being quoted and used, he could speak out on that and explain how his results are being improperly applied (if they are). But if his work is valid, it was silly of him to issue a retraction.
Darwinism makes atheists look stupid.
I am duly chastisted for my typo. Now would you like to address your stupid assertion?
That's the best explanation of why evolutionism and old earthism are not science that you have ever posted. Good boy, you're finally learning.
Sorry, no. Science is not pure theory. As Heinlein noted,
Piling up facts is not science--science is facts-and-theories. Facts alone have limited use and lack meaning: a valid theory organizes them into far greater usefulness.
A powerful theory not only embraces old facts and new but also discloses unsuspected facts.
Expanded Universe: The New Worlds of Robert A. Heinlein, 1980, pp. 480-481
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