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Topic: can some aspect of Darwinism be falsified?
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Zachriel
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Member # 1793
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posted 15. June 2006 14:20
Melvin H. Fox: "However, I do agree with you that where science is concerned this intuition can’t stand alone."
Quite so! And, indeed we wouldn't need a scientific method if intuition worked reliably with phenomena not of a human scale. Intuition says the Earth is fixed, or that we'll never know what stars are made of, but science reveals the facts by a process of hypothesis and prediction.
The Scientific Method
[ 15. June 2006, 14:39: Message edited by: Zachriel ]
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Shi
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Member # 1923
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posted 15. June 2006 17:09
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That's called puddle-logic.
"It's rather like a puddle waking up one morning. A puddle wakes up one morning and thinks: 'This is a very interesting world I find myself in. It fits me very neatly. In fact it fits me so neatly... I mean really precise isn't it?... It must have been made to have me in it.'"
Regardless what you call that logic, it is the first and best hypothesis to entertain before one should consider any other less obvious alternatives.
quote:
And even if you hold to puddle-logic, it's not science because it doesn't make empirical predictions beyond the sense of wonder already described.
The puddle-logic is not the theory. It is the starting ground to build a theory that can predict things. The mind set is like this: Okay the world looks like being made with human as the ultimate goal and let us build a theory on that premise and see if it explains things better than any alternative theories. The fact of matter is that no one is yet smart enough to have built a theory like that. So to critisize the puddle logic as being non-scientific is missing the point. A theory based on that logic has yet to be formulated. By the same reasoning, ID is not a theory and is only the premise to build a theory. If there is a designer, let us figure out what theory he uses to create the world. Once that theory is out, then you can start to judge whether it is predictive or not.
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Shi
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Member # 1923
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posted 15. June 2006 17:31
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The Theory of Evolution is a theory concerning biology. It it not a "coherent theory of all nature".
But it does say a lot on the key issue that is at the heart of any coherent theory of all nature: is there a God. It says that God has no role in biology. It is the best weapon for an atheist to justify his position. NDE made it possible To be a proud intelligent atheist, as Dawkins would say. NDE is the best alternative to the God position and that is why there is evolution versus creation debate in the public. To claim NDE is only a limited theory is half truth and is blind to its broad implications. NDE people find it convenient to advertise its broader implications when it suits their self interest and in the mean time would shamelessly shout that we never intended to touch opon anything other than biology when NDE was found to be incapable of explaining certain things.
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Zachriel
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Member # 1793
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posted 15. June 2006 18:16
Shi: "The puddle-logic is not the theory."
Quite so.
Shi: "It is the starting ground to build a theory that can predict things."
Workable scientific hypotheses have historically come from almost any source, including deep-thought or vast experience in a field of study, but also from a hunch, a dream (Kekulé), serendipity, an inspiration, from fanciful thought-experiments (Einstein), a lucky guess, or even while playing cards (Mendeleev). However any such scientific hypothesis must be reasonably consistent with known observations and make scientific predictions of future observations. Most hypotheses are naturally derived as extensions of existing theories.
Shi: "By the same reasoning, ID is not a theory and is only the premise to build a theory."
You are correct that statements of Intelligent Design are usually so vague so as to not constitute a scientific theory. Whether such metaphysics can turned into a scientific theory is doubtful. Such appeals have always been found to be without empirical foundation.
Shi: "It says that God has no role in biology."
There is no scientific evidence of divine intervention in evolution. That is a quite different statement. There is also no scientific evidence of divine intervention in germ theory or meteorology, but at one time disease and the weather were attributed to supernatural forces.
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Shi
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Member # 1923
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posted 15. June 2006 18:22
The core of NDE is not limited to biology at all and has very broad philosophical meaning. It is this: random variations selected by accidents can create any complexity in nature. Nothing in this phrase touches biology. Why then it must be limited to biology? Not at all. Indeed, ultra Darwinist like Dawkins loves to illustrate this core principle of NDE by using examples not related to biology, such as Monkey tying keyboards to create meaningful sentences and computer modelings.
The alternative position is this: random and non-radom variations selected by a conscious observer or God can create any complexity in nature. Indeed, this position explains how the human observer create things.
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Zachriel
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Member # 1793
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posted 15. June 2006 18:38
Shi: "The core of NDE is not limited to biology at all and has very broad philosophical meaning."
The Theory of Evolution strictly concerns biology, and has since Darwin. Whether it has broad philosophical implications, or just scares the willies out of you, is immaterial to its validity as a scientific theory.
At one time, it was believed that the Earth was the physical center of Creation with God in Heaven Above. Then the scientific discovery of the Earth's movement sent shock waves through Christiandom. But the metaphysical shock was irrelevant to the scientific theory.
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Shi
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Member # 1923
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posted 15. June 2006 18:45
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There is no scientific evidence of divine intervention in evolution
how does science know the history of human creation if such event is not repeatable? It simply cannot. Therefore it is incapable of saying that divine is not involved in the past. Is divine involved today? I can imagine so that is still consistent with the abiliy or inability of science. The divine may appear in the form of an insight in an individual mind. The features of divine action is uniqueness, non-repeatable, and individual specific. Such action is thus non-verifiable by science but cannot be excluded by science. The domain and evidence of divine action in the past is the creation of the DNA code of human but is now today the creative activities of the mind. Can science explain the music of Mozart? If not, can it rule out God in the music of Mozart? Obviously it cannot. It is non-sense to say that there is no scientific evidence of God intervention, when such intervention is by natue inherently incompatible with or beyond the ability of scientific methods.
God cannot be experimentally proven. The only way to prove it is like proving a mathematical conjecture, ie. by logic. One must first have to formulate a law of nature with God as an essential part of the law. The coherence of the law is its ultimate proof, just like a math law. One can then look to see if it explains nature better than any alternative laws. If it finds no factural exceptions, then it is the correct law, regardless whether God is proven or not by scientific measurements. God, like a quantum, cannot be precisely measured. If everyone accepts quantum despite its uncertainty, there is no reason why God cannot be accepted the same way as quanta.
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Zachriel
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Member # 1793
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posted 15. June 2006 18:55
Shi: "how does science know the history of human creation if such event is not repeatable? It simply cannot."
That is simply not the case. That's like saying we don't know that dinosaurs once roamed the Earth. They did, and we have the evidence of it. The scientific evidence clearly indicates common descent with other vertebrates.
Shi: "Therefore it is incapable of saying that divine is not involved in the past."
That wasn't the statement. The statement was "There is no scientific evidence of divine intervention in evolution".
Shi: "The divine may appear in the form of an insight in an individual mind. The features of divine action is uniqueness, non-repeatable, and individual specific. Such action is thus non-verifiable by science but cannot be excluded by science."
Science doesn't exclude it, it ignores it because it can't be constructed as a valid scientific hypothesis.
Shi: "It is non-sense to say that there is no scientific evidence of God intervention, when such intervention is by natue inherently incompatible with or beyond the ability of scientific methods."
Now you got it!
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Shi
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Member # 1923
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posted 15. June 2006 19:04
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Whether it has broad philosophical implications, or just scares the willies out of you, is immaterial to its validity as a scientific theory.
If a scientific theory implies somthing that is simply wrong in logic and facts, it is evidence that the theory is wrong. Random variations selected by accidents has never been shown to crate anything complex and has many factural contradictions.
All fundamental natural laws of nature impact our philosophical views. None of them so far contradicts human behavior. But NDE does. Either our behavior is against natural law or NDE is not a correct natural law. As simple as that.
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John A. Davison
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Member # 1425
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posted 15. June 2006 19:11
NeoDarwinian evolution is a hoax perpetrated and perpetuated by mentalities that are genetically incapable of realizing that there was a purpose to every aspect of the the universe. They were "prescribed" to be that way or as the old saw puts it, they were "born that way." We are all victimns. Some of us have been luckier than others.
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Shi
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Member # 1923
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posted 15. June 2006 19:13
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Science doesn't exclude it, it ignores it because it can't be constructed as a valid scientific hypothesis.
But NDE does exclude God when it says human evolved from some primates by purely natural mechanisms. What if I say that God interveined to alter some quanta and in turn mutations. Can NDE prove me wrong? It obviously cannot. If it cannot not, why does it conclude that creative evolution is without God intervention?
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Zachriel
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Member # 1793
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posted 15. June 2006 19:34
Shi: "If a scientific theory implies somthing that is simply wrong in logic and facts"
Except that the Theory of Evolution largely fits the facts, makes numerous confirmable empirical predictions, and unifies observations from a large number of different fields of study.
I assume the following is what you consider to be what is "wrong in logic and facts".
Shi: "All fundamental natural laws of nature impact our philosophical views. None of them so far contradicts human behavior. But NDE does. Either our behavior is against natural law or NDE is not a correct natural law."
In what respect? How does the Theory of Evolution contradict human behavior?
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Zachriel
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Member # 1793
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posted 15. June 2006 19:38
Shi: "But NDE does exclude God when it says human evolved from some primates by purely natural mechanisms."
Maybe it excludes your version of God. In any case, you don't have to believe the Earth moves, or that humans are animals; but that is what the scientific evidence indicates.
Shi: "I say that God interveined to alter some quanta and in turn mutations. Can NDE prove me wrong?"
There is no scientific evidence to support your assertion. If you want to hold it, that's fine. Just don't claim you have scientific justification for that belief, as you do not.
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Shi
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Member # 1923
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posted 15. June 2006 19:39
How pathetic it is that a law (NDE) that is supposed to teach how to survive (survival of the fittest) must be rejected by humans for the sake of human survival.
according to NDE, our brain evolved to help our survival. Surely, our brain will be able to find a law to guide our survival or future evolution. That evolution law obviously is not NDE and remains to be found.
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Shi
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Member # 1923
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posted 15. June 2006 19:43
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In what respect? How does the Theory of Evolution contradict human behavior?
I hope you agree that the behaviors advacated by Hitler and Marx who are inspired by Darwin are not the kind that will aid human survival.
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