Today at school there was a table set up with a religious group. The purpose of the group was to ask questions about religion, and why the universe needed to be "intelligently designed". When evolution was brought up, it was brushed off with "Evolution is a lie! It doesn't make sense, it sounds like something a five year old kid once told his dad, and his dad decided to go along with it!". They insisted that the earth is 4000 to 6000 years old, and when I brought up the fact that fossils exist which suggest the earth is much older I was met with "who told you that? There is absolutely no proof of it, and science is lying. It has an agenda to deceive people".
I am absolutely fed up with this ignorance and stupidity. People could argue that ignorance does not equal stupidity. In many cases, they are spot on. However, there exists a wealth of information which demonstrates the earth is nowhere near 4000-6000 years old, and that evolution is true. At this stage, people are choosing to remain ignorant. I live in Lithuania, which is heavily Catholic. During soviet times it would have been difficult to obtain information. Newsflash: the Soviet Union ended in 1991. Today, while not the wealthiest nation on the planet, we have access to the fucking internet. People just need to wake up.
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How could we tell if that was true? By comparing the results of science to what? more science? That seems problematic.
What they really need to do is check if what science predicts matches observation. But that is just a restatement of what science is. Back to the same problem.
If they are not fully against science, and merely feel it fails or is deceptive at times, then using science to expose science is definitely problematic, but its problematic for science, not them.
One way to tell that someone is lying, is to hear what they say at any given time, and compare it to what they said at another. So, scientific contradiction is problematic, since both the new and old information, were both achieved via the same method.
"If they are not fully against science, and merely feel it fails or is deceptive at times, then using science to expose science is definitely problematic, but its problematic for science, not them."
This is a lie, they simply are denying scientific facts that contradict parts of their religious beliefs, this subjective cherry picking of what parts of science they will accept and what they will not is meaningless to science, as science weighs all evidence the same, and applies the same rigorous process to all ideas and claims, unlike creationists of course.
"One way to tell that someone is lying, is to hear what they say at any given time, and compare it to what they said at another. So, scientific contradiction is problematic, since both the new and old information, were both achieved via the same method."
What a truly asinine statement, are you saying the fact science gained new knowledge about tectonic plate shift that contradicts what we thought before makes tectonic plate shift "suspect"? Can you not see how stupid such a claim is? One of science's greatest strengths is that it can follow the evidence wherever it leads, irrespective of what it thought was true previously, and abandon any idea or claim if the evidence demands it.
Unlike religions of course who are stuck espousing things so obviously erroneous, like young earth creationism, that they are a laughing stock to any half educated person. Science seeks the truth by following the evidence no matter what, religion insist it has the truth and no amount of evidence will convince them to open their minds to anything new.
No, it makes science suspect.
We are discussing a method which can produce wrong information. If scientists using this method, used to think phlogiston was responsible for combustion, then other scientists using the same method, now attribute it to oxygen. How do you account for the inconsistency? Science improvises more than you seem to give it credit for.
The progress of science isn't merely additive, in which we merely add new information to our knowledge. Science progresses through change as well, by destroying the information it once thought was right. That's problematic.
Have you read Kuhn or Laudan? Kuhn essentially suggests that science progresses when the old generation with old ideas die off, and the new generation takes over with new ideas. He turns science into mob psychology.
What you always seem to miss is that all scientific information is pretty much guaranteed to be wrong. I could list stuff all day that is wrong but a sample might be:
All of those and many more are known to be wrong. Science isn't in the right/wrong true/false business. Science is in the business of predicting the state of a system at time 2, given the state of the system at time 1. Evolution does an excellent job of that (as do the items I listed before); God did it does not.
Well I agree with you. That's not something I miss, it's something I try to express.
For example I was taught that if for whatever reason I find a correlation between aggression, and peoples whose favorite animals are dolphins. I should include dolphins in a personality test. Because despite it being a trivial observation, and perhaps clearly unrelated, knowing that someone likes dolphins allows me to predict aggression.
Predictions are complicated, but science doesn't just aim to predict, it aims to explain. As far as explanations go, God does just a good a job as evolution, if not better. The concept of God can become vague enough that it can explain any observation.
I forgot which philosopher it was that showed how the Greek gods were just as good at explaining the natural world than any of our modern theories.
Edit: I found the philosopher. Its W.V. Quine: "As an empiricist I continue to think of the conceptual scheme of science as a tool, ultimately, for predicting future experience in the light of past experience. Physical objects are conceptually imported into the situation as convenient intermediaries—not by definition in terms of experience, but simply as irreducible posits comparable, epistemologically, to the gods of Homer. For my part I do believe in physical objects and not in Homer's gods; and I consider it a scientific error to believe otherwise. But in point of epistemological footing the physical objects and the gods differ only in degree and not in kind."
Actually no, that is a common misconception. That is also why the following is worth 10 points on the crackpot index:
What? That seems aimed more towards you than me. You seemed to suggest they predict observations exclusively, and thus not "explain 'why' they occur"
My position is that theories DO aim to explain 'why.' After all, theories don't fail to provide a mechanism, they ARE the mechanism.
P.S. Send me the link for the HTML codes. Sometimes I want to emphasize words and am unable to. I remember you posted it a while back.
Failure to understand the crackpot index, should be worth additional crackpot points.
You quoted me saying "science doesn't just aim to predict, it aims to explain."
The index describes someone that says the opposite: That a theory "doesn't explain "why" (phenomena) occur."
So perhaps additional points are in order, since you didn't understand the index.
No Breezy; the index is a list of things that earn crackpots points. Criticizing a theory by saying it does not provide a why is worth crackpot points (because that is not the goal of science). As usual your Dunning-Kruger is acting up again.
Right, something which I didn't do. Since I was the first to point out that science aims to explain, not just predict. Which, mind you, I said because your statement seemed to ignore explanations: "Science is in the business of predicting the state of a system."
So the question becomes: Why did you omit science's explanatory role in your statement?
Because that isn't the role/goal of science; mainly because that would be a recursive nightmare.
Thus you qualify for the points:
"10 points for arguing that while a current well-established theory predicts phenomena correctly, it DOESN'T EXPLAIN "why" they occur."
Dunning-Kruger
The entry is making fun of people who think science should explain "why".
For example, a common criticism of the theory of gravity (either) is that it does not explain why there is a force of gravity. Making that complaint gets them 10 points because while there is no explanation, none is required.
If you say so.
But better men than me have said otherwise:
-"What is the universe made of (fact) and WHY does it work this way (theory).” -Stephen Jay Gould
-"Theories are nets cast to catch what we call ‘the world’: to rationalize, to EXPLAIN, and to master it. We endeavor to make the mesh ever finer and finer." - Karl Popper
The attached image is from my chemistry textbook. Say the word and I'll add more quotes from textbooks, scientists, and philosophers.
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"Hypotheses non fingo" - Newton
"Science is prediction, not explanation" - Hoyle
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What what what? A while back your Dunning-Kruger brain told us that you can't learn chemistry until you learn quantum mechanics because you saw quantum mechanics mentioned in a chemistry book. I guess that wasn't true, huh?
Good thing hypotheses aren't theories I suppose
What a boring enterprise science would be if it didn't aim to explain observations. Predictions are the least interesting thing science does. Not to mention what kind of predictions do you think define science, deterministic predictions or probabilistic predictions? If you allow for probabilistic predictions, with no other method of demarcation, you've just allowed astrology into science.
Do you think astrology is a science? Because based on your criteria it's definitely a science, just a bad one.
In contrast I could disqualify astrology because it doesn't seek to explain anything in the natural world. It merely attempts to divine human behavior by observing celestial events. It doesn't bother to explain why such a thing should work in the first place.
Science does not and never has dealt with why questions... Only how.
That is demonstrably false. Atomic theory explain why water breaks down into two substances with specific mass ratios, it doesn't explain how it does so. Germ theory explain why we get sick, not how.
"Why" is the big question science seeks to answer. It's the question little children ask. It's the cornerstone of curiosity.
"How" is a question of methodology, and only makes sense to answer once you know the why. Once I know germs are the reason why we get sick, we can start to ask how germs make us sick. Are germs using toxics? Are they blocking our immune functions or hijacking them?
Heck, even evolution seeks to explain "why" there is so much diversity of life while maintaining similarities. By suggesting life derives from a common ancestor. But how there is diversity is explained by natural selection, mutations, etc.
This is the unfortunate failing of language. Sure you can ask why questions but you don't get why answers... You get more why questions. The answers you do get are to questions of what is and how is it. Why do germs spread? Who cares? How do they spread? That's what science answers. Evolution doesn't answer why we are here... Only how we got here. There is no why. No purpose or intent. That's what I mean by that. Why do we evolve can be framed as a question... And it makes sense too. But we're not getting any closer to that answer... We do have good answers as to how it happens though.
Edit:let me clarify that I understand that people use the word "why" in science. I'm talking the essence of the word. For example:
"Why is the earth round? " gravity (and a while bunch of following words would be the answer)
It would be better to say:"what causes the earth to be round? " im being nitpicky because why is subject to the equivocation fallacy a lot. Questions like "why are we here? " are philosophical questions that the answers, if they exist, may never be found. But how did we get here can be. That's why we say that what science actually does is answer the how questions. And I, frankly don't care why. I just care about what is and how it all works.
And that's why, in the beginning I said it's an unfortunate failing of language. We can mean different things with the same word sometimes. I prefer to use words in such a way that there is little to no misunderstanding possible(unfortunately I don't do that100% of the time).
I suppose it is a failing of language, since you seem to be thinking of "why" too abstractly. Why is used to inquire about purpose and intent when you frame it that way, however it is also used to ask about causality and reasons.
Notice the difference. Why is there diversity of life? Because we evolved (casuality, reason). But why did we evolve? Now you're asking about purpose.
It's interesting that you added intent to your definition. When you ask questions of intent to human beings, you become a psychologist, attempting to decipher the underlying cause of a behavior. Why are her pupils dilating, her heartrate rising, her blood vessels constricting, after she saw the snake? Because she intends to either fight or flee.
You can turn "how" and "what" questions into non-scientific, philosophical, spiritual, metaphysical questions too. "How are we still alive?" "What about love?" "How can I become more spiritual?" Or the most famous question of all "what is the meaning of life?"
It's up to you to ask questions for mechanical reasons and not metaphysical ones. There's no such thing as the "essence" of a question, only how you decide to ask it. Science requires that you ask questions which can be answered scientifically, that goes for "why" questions as well.
"No, it makes science suspect."
No what? What makes science suspect? In what way is science suspect? Do you deny any scientific facts that don't refute your archaic creation myth?
"We are discussing a method which can produce wrong information."
Like religion then, except science accepts the best evidence admits an error and our knowledge increases, whereas creatards are still trying to claim the universe and earth are a few thousand years old.
"How do you account for the inconsistency?"
Human beings are fallible, and make errors, but science is an objective method that means we can correct these when they happen. Now explain why a message from a purportedly omnipotent omniscient being is filled with risible erroneous claims if it is not human in origin?
" Science improvises more than you seem to give it credit for."
No it doesn't, scientists do, you seem unaware of the distinction, or it's implications.
"The progress of science isn't merely additive, in which we merely add new information to our knowledge."
So you think finding a correct explanation, and revising an earlier error is problematic when searching for the truth? I'm inclined to disagree as that is absurd.
"Science progresses through change as well, by destroying the information it once thought was right. That's problematic."
As well??? Firstly science doesn't only advance by destroying everything it once thought correct, the idea that are reversed are a minute proportion, and science as a method is improving how rigorously it scrutinises claims and peer reviews them. Science has the inbuilt ability to correct itself, that's why it has such an astonishing track record of success in such a short space of time, religion doesn't correct itself EVER, how can the immutable word of an omniscient deity be corrected exactly? Which no doubt explains why YECs cling to risible nonsense that has been utterly refuted beyond any reasonable doubt.
"Have you read Kuhn or Laudan? Kuhn essentially suggests that science progresses when the old generation with old ideas die off, and the new generation takes over with new ideas."
So science makes progress then, as I have been saying, whilst religion still champions bronze age dogma. You've just neatly explained the difference.
"No it doesn't, scientists do, you seem unaware of the distinction, or it's implications"
I am unaware of the distinction. There is no science independent of the scientist.
"No it doesn't, scientists do, you seem unaware of the distinction, or it's implications"
I am unaware of the distinction. There is no science independent of the scientist.
I know that, I just said so, you quoted me saying it above? It is correct that the human method and practice of science can't occur independently of the humans who use it to objectively validate the work of scientists.
One question that fascinates me in relation to the "Young Earth Creation" model is population. There are 7 billion people in the world. If the Earth is only 6,000 years old, there have only been about 200 generations (fewer if you believe the outlandish stories about life spans in the Old Testament).
How can you get from two (Adam and Eve) to 7 billion in 200 generations? For most of that time, there was no modern medicine. Child mortality was extremely high. And there were frequent wars and plagues, many of which are recorded in the Bible itself.
I would love to hear a Young Earth creationist explain how the world population got so big.
Don't know how precise the attached graph is, but it still serves its purpose. We know the earth reached one billion people around 1800. In just two hundred years we've added another six or seven billion.
If six billion people can appear is just two hundred years. Surely one billion can appear in the previous 6,000. Not to mention this graph already takes plagues and wars into account. So to the contrary, if we remove those variable, it would explain why we didn't reach 7 billion earlier.
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@John 61X Breezy: "If six billion people can appear is just two hundred years."
And in response to that argument, we can ask what changed in the past two hundred years to cause that accelerated growth. The answer would be improvements in our knowledge of public sanitation, epidemiology, vaccination, obstetrics, food production and processing, food preservation, food sanitation, etc. In other words, modern science happened.
Even young Earth creationists would have to acknowledge improvements in these areas. I'm sure they go to hospital when they're sick or injured and expect to have anesthetic for surgery. So how can they decide which science to accept and which to reject?
I'm not sure how your response applies, or affects my argument.
But perhaps the better question is how does anyone decide what to accept and reject? There are things which scientists disagree with one another on, how do they decide what those things are?
Nobody can disagree with the data, but people can disagree with how it ought to be interpreted.
@John: "I'm not sure how your response applies, or affects my argument."
I'm asking how creationists can accept scientific knowledge about medicine, public health, epidemiology, etc., while rejecting it about paleontology, genetics, geology, etc. This is especially puzzling when you consider the overlap between these fields. For example, genetics are used both in medicine and evolutionary biology.
On the question of how one decides what to accept and reject, I guess that depends on how honest you are. If your world view is based on the belief that the Earth is flat and then you are presented with clear evidence to the contrary, do you change your world view or dismiss the evidence?
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