The "Threat" of Creationism, by Isaac Asimov

Internet ^ | 1984 | Isaac Asimov

[Condorman]

...Gould for instance, [has] been discredited...

Well, he IS dead, but I hardly think it's the same thing...

[balrog666]

Without being snide, your request for a single source would necessarily require some basic background knowledge.

Don't forget you're joining a thread that's almost 1600 posts long and apparently you didn't read many of those posts. Or the previous 300 threads before this one.

For those joining the topic for the first time or without a sufficient scientific background, these tomes will provide the core building blocks.

Um, no they won't and for obvious reasons.

Because so many of the strict evolutionists, Gould for instance, have been discredited,

BWAAAAAAAAAAAHAHAHA! Only in your dreams.

... it is difficult to provide a comprehensive, intelligent-design-free suggestion of a good book.

If you say so.

It is also disappointing to see the entire list dismissed out of hand because of the inclusion of Darwin.

Wrong reason. Try again in light of the other comments you will get.

It is important to study the history of the discovery of scientific theories to fully understand the later branches that any particulary theory takes.

I agree that it's sometimes important and often useful but if you branch off into Neverneverland with Behe, et al, and stay there, you've wasted your time.

[longshadow]

By the way, thank you for attributing to me the experimentation phase of the scientific method ("the second rule I invented"), but I must be honest in that I first learned of it from my sixth grade teacher.

Who do you think is more likely to be able to provide an accurate description of what a scientific theory is: your sixth-grade teacher, or Karl Popper?

What Makes A Theory Scientific?

"Science is what we have learned about how to keep from fooling ourselves." - physicist Richard Feynman

The big question about a theory is whether it's right or wrong.

Unfortunately, it's impossible to know that a scientific theory is right. The theory may agree beautifully with all the evidence - today. But science isn't like mathematics. There can be no guarantee about what evidence we will discover tomorrow.

So, we go for the next best thing, which is proving theories wrong. That's easy. You just find some evidence that contradicts what the theory says. The theory is then falsified and stays that way.

So, a scientific theory is one which can in principle be falsified. The theory has to make strong statements about evidence. If the statements aren't strong, then the theory fits any evidence, and is unfalsifiable. That's bad.

It's bad for three very practical reasons. First, a theory which can't make predictions is a dead end. Second, it would be useless. Oil companies are very pleased that geologists can predict where to drill for oil. And third, if we have two rival theories, we want to use evidence to choose between them. If they are unfalsifiable, then evidence doesn't do that for us.

While no number of observations in conformity with the hypothesis that, say, all planets have elliptical orbits can show that the hypothesis is true or even that tomorrow's planet will have an elliptical orbit, only one observation of a non-elliptical planetary orbit will refute the hypothesis. Falsification can get a grip where positive proof is ever beyond us; the demarcation between science and non-science lies in the manner in which scientific theories make testable predictions and are given up when they fail their tests. http://www.xrefer.com/entry/553218

One can sum up all this by saying that the criterion of the scientific status of a theory is its falsifiability, or refutability, or testability.

Sir Karl Popper (1902-1994)

The most important philosopher of science since Francis Bacon (1561-1626), Sir Karl Popper finally solved the puzzle of scientific method, which in practice had never seemed to conform to the principles or logic described by Bacon. Instead of scientific knowledge being discovered and verified by way of inductive generalizations, leaping from data into blank minds, in terms that go back to Aristotle, Popper realized that science advances instead by deductive falsification through a process of "conjectures and refutations." http://www.friesian.com/popper.htm

source: http://www.geocities.com/healthbase/falsification.html

Notice that NOWHERE in Popper's comments on scientific theories does he use the word "EXPERIMENT". He uses the words "falsifiability" and "testability," and throughout his writings refers to scientific theories that are capable of refutation by OBSERVATION.

I trust this puts an end to you mistaken belief that theories that do not involve experimental reproduction of the phenomona within theire scope are somehow not "scientific."

[balrog666]

Nice post.

[PatrickHenry]

The theory has to make strong statements about evidence. If the statements aren't strong, then the theory fits any evidence, and is unfalsifiable. That's bad.

Kinda reminds me of my tagline.

[balrog666]

Kinda reminds me of my tagline.

Good point! Where's his tagline?!

[VadeRetro]

True, Behe is partisan. Can you suggest an infallible text on evolution?

There are no infallible texts, but none of the ID writers including Behe are good sources for "both sides of the story." I would suggest in listing sources conceding up front the existence of two sides and not abusing the naivete of the beginner about who the players are.

All of the ID writers including Behe are hostile witnesses and make a botch of describing the mechanisms and implications of evolution. Behe, just for instance, thinks he discovered a concept called "irreducible complexity" which he swears cannot be explained by evolution. Most biologists think Behe's irreducible complexity is Muller's old "irreversibility" which the latter pondered and explained by the scaffolding effects. Then there are all those guys working in molecular evolution who were stunned to hear from Behe that they and their work don't exist.

[TaxRelief]

So, your collective buttons have been pressed. Gould can do no wrong? Never makes mistakes? Here they come one by one so they can all be defended to the death.

In his essay, "Male Nipples and Clitoral Ripples," Gould complains about adaptationists' insufficient testing of their evolutionary hypotheses about the origins of the female orgasm. In the same essay, Gould himself declares without evidence (and without presenting a single testable prediction) that "the real answer" is that female orgasm is analogous to a male nipple: functionless baggage from early, sexually undifferentiated embryonic development. (Recent evidence points out the errors of his ways...)

...apparently you didn't read many of those posts. Or the previous 300 threads before this one. Very intimidating. I think I'll walk away with my *tail* between my legs.

[bondserv]

scientific theories make testable predictions and are given up when they fail their tests.

testable = experiment.

[bondserv]

I dub js1138 as a godly, loving, truth seeking, Biblically literate, repentant, understanding his low station and therefore unable to denigrate a sincere fellow human being.

OK lets start with how God made things perfectly, then man chose to mess it up by disobeying. "The fall of man caused the creation to begin a process of waxing old like a garment."

Next explain how the results of the flood can be seen clearly as one drives north on I15 through Las Vegas. Mud creating a wedge of earth up against the mountains that line the valley, as the water rushed back downbigstream into the crust of the earth. (Include photos and geologist affirmation of theory).

Then produce a complete list of biological animals existent since 1800, followed by a list of extinct animals since 1800, followed by a list of newly evoluted animals since 1800.

Next program a computer model of the earth in a fully submerged flood condition for over a year, and demonstrate the strata formed by such an event, including the compression formuli to determine the predictable compaction numbers expected by a year submerged under an ocean, as well as the swirling water effects that pooled bones in deathbeds causing evolutionary anthropologists fits.

Thats a good start, the last one may take a while, so network with some Christian computer programers to hurry the process along.

God Bless your efforts Brother.

[bondserv]

Thank you for your kind words.

I too have gleaned many insightful angles on the discussion from your posts.

Remember were discussing a bunch of old junk, including our bodies, God will wipe the board clean here shortly.

"I look for a city not built by human hands, but for a city built by God."

Short timing Pilgrims sharing the love of Christ with some acquaintances on FreeRepublic.

[js1138]

I eagerly await scientific confirmation of your assertions, particularly those concerning the flood. this has been tried about 5000 times on these threads, but perhaps you will get lucky.

[PatrickHenry]

Placemarker.

[VadeRetro]

(Recent evidence points out the errors of his ways...)

If I understand you so far, Gould seems to have been wrong about something. Therefore, he's not a fallible text and discredited.

Behe's howlers don't seem to have had the same effect on him, as far as you're concerned. Already the situation is very odd.

Now consider that Gould actually made a significant contribution in punctuated equlibrium. He spent several years defending it and has brought most biologists around to recognizing that he and Eldredge improved the model in understanding how many cases of speciation work. OK, Behe thinks he's made a contribution rivalling those of Newton and Einstein, but not many people agree.

I suggest to you that everyone is wrong once in a while, but the leading lights are people who have been conspicuously right about something important and generally can think their way out of a wet paper bag.

[VadeRetro]

Therefore, he's not a fallible text and discredited.

Therefore he IS a fallible text.

[PatrickHenry]

Behe's howlers don't seem to have had the same effect on him, as far as you're concerned. Already the situation is very odd.

The double standard you have observed is perfectly understandable. Creationism (and it's little sister, ID) is THE TRUTH!!, and therefore blunders, lies, out-of-context quotes, and just plain stupidity in support of such a spendid doctrine are all quite excusable -- even commendable. Eeeee-vooo-luuu-shun, on the other hand, is a false, Satanic, Marxist, Hitlerian, Clintonoid heap of garbage, so why cut those guys any slack at all?

[Rachumlakenschlaff]

This is actually a pretty darned good explanation of how scientific progress is made, including biology and studies of evolution. No one here is disputing you on this. You say, however, that this system does not apply to evolution, and it most assuredly does!

But without evolution begin subject to experimentation, how does it apply?

[Rachumlakenschlaff]

Hopefully this will give them the opportunity to test some of their theories under more controlled circumstances, but the possibility that they will overturn years of theory based on observation as opposed to direct experimentation is vanishingly small. The astrophysicists know their stuff.

Experimentation is just detailed observation of the real world where you get to set the initial conditions yourself. It aids observation, but is not critical. Does the theory match the real world? That's the question.

Our understanding of the real world is based upon the observations of an almost insignificantly small corner of the universe. Our observations of distant stars are based entirely on what can be learned from the electromagnetic radiation received from them; and littered with the underlying hope that nothing has interfered with it on its journey across billions of light years. The data set that we have does not even approach a representative sample of the real data set. Simple illustration: whenever NASA has sent probes to the planets in our own solor system, the things we learn invariably turn upside down what we think we knew before. The reports are always littered with words like "surprise, unexpected, revolutionary".

[Rachumlakenschlaff]

Balrog has already addressed this, but there's more to be said. First, you most definitely did say (or certainly imply) that experiments prove theories. In 1574, you said that about predictions, which is what experiments actually are. But experiments are not the only way in which a theory can be falsified. Evolution could very easily be falsified if fossils turned up that couldn't possibly fit into the pattern of evolution. Every new fossil is thus a test of the theory of evolution. Evolution predicts that all of life, past and present, fits into the framework of the theory. There's thus a lot of room for falsification. Not so with creationism, which can't be falsified and which (as you agree) isn't science.

I suspect that on some of this, we are not so much disagreeing as we are using the terms in somewhat different ways. Someone said that "experiments test theories". I completely agree. Where I think we differ is that I do not believe that predictions, devoid of experimentation (testing) are sufficient to prove theories. I do not consider predictions, by themselves, to be a sufficient test of a theory (neither does the scientific method). Psychics make predictions, they do not test theories.

Of course, if a prediction is shown to be false, then the theory is disproved. However, a prediction shown to be true is along the lines of circumstantial evidence. And, as in evolution, when a prediction is shown to be false (e.g., gradualism), the theory is not disproved, it is simply changed. I am totally convinced that if large amounts of fossils were found totally out of order (and could not be explained away), someone would simply posit an entirely different form of evolutionary model to account for the facts and evolution would be claimed to still be proved, even though it is now an entirely different model.

[Rachumlakenschlaff]

Darwin is good if you understand that he stands in biology about where Maxwell does in physics

Doesn't say much for biology.