CEG\'er
Joined: Jul 2000
Posts: 443 |
Originally posted by Viss1:
Evolution = science
Creationism = philosophy/theology
Teach one in science class, teach the other in philospohy class. Better yet, teach it in church.
Thus spake Viss1
I disagree, "evolution" though I hate to use that term because it encompasses a wide range of theories in reality, is pseudoscience, and also belongs in philosophy. Neo-darwinism is no longer just a biological theory, it has become the most important element in the religion of scientific naturalism. More often than not, scientific naturalism and neo-darwinists no longer use the rudimentary tools that are fundamental to science and in looking at the history of life, their methodologies have become tainted over time. Scientific naturalism now has it's own ethical agenda and it's own plan for salvation through social and genetic engineering. Many of the propositions of Darwinism and especially scientific naturalism go far beyond anything empirical science can demonstrate. So, to sustain the neo-Darwinist worldview, scientific naturalists have had to resort to tactics that Popper, a renouned and well known advocate of science, warned truth-seekers to avoid at all costs. The most important device in current use is the deceptive use of the vague term "evolution".
When any critic of evolution demands empirical evidence, neo-Darwinists just assume the creative power of natural selection and employ it to explain whatever change or lack of change has been observed, or they avoid the test by responding that scientists are discovering alternative mechanisms which relegate selection to a less important role (which fundamentally changes Darwins original theory BTW). The "fact" of evolution therefore remains unquestioned, even if there is a certain amount of healthy debate about the theory.
If the purpose of neo-Darwinism is to persuade the public to believe that there is no purposeful intelligence that transcends the natural world (and that's what the mission has become), then this purpose implies two important limitations upon scientific inquiry. First, scientists may not consider all the possibilities, but must restrict themselves to those which are consistent with a strict philosophical naturalism. Second, scientists may not falsify an element of Darwinism, such as the creative power of natural selection, until and unless they can provide an acceptable substitute (like punctuated equilibrium, explanations for statis, etc.). This rule is an absolute necessity because advocates of naturalism must at all times have a complete theory at their disposal to prevent any rival philosophy from establishing a foothold.
Neo-Darwinists have taken the wrong view of science because they've been infected with the craving to be right. This has resulted in pseudoscientific practices primarily because most scientists do not understand that there is a difference between the scientific method of inquiry, as articulated by Popper, and the philosophical program of scientific naturalism. One reason this difference isn't realized is because the scientific naturalists fear the growth of any religious fanaticism if the power of naturalistic philosophy is weakened at all. The inherent problem here is that whenever we utilize science in any other cause - whether racial, religious, or political - the result is that the scientists themselves become fanatical.
Exposing Darwinism to possible falsification, in reality, won't imply support for any other theory, including any theory based upon religious beliefs. Returning to the truth of scientific inquiry at it's most basic level, merely means we're exposing ignorance whereever it may exist. This is not a defeat for science, it is in fact a liberation, because it removes the dead weight of prejudice, and frees us all to look for the real truth.
What we all should be interested in is the unbiased scientific investigation into the history of life, and in particular in reference to this subject about how the enormously complex organs of plants and animals came into existence. This work does not necessarily oppose evolution (or religion for that matter). The truth is that we know a great deal less than has been claimed. We do not know how the immensely complex organ systems of plants and animals could have been created by mindless and purposeless natural processes, as Darwinists say they must have been. Darwinian theory attributes biological complexity to the accumulation of adaptive micromutations by natural selection, but the creative power of this hypothetical mechanism has never once been demonstrated, and the fossil evidence is inconsistent with the claim that biological creation occured in that way (in fact the fossil record dramatically proves stasis more than anything else). The philosophically important part of Darwinism - it's mechanism for creating complex things that did not exist before - is therefore not really part of empirical science at all, but rather a deduction from naturalistic philosophy. A "critic of evolution" therefore is someone who distinguishes between naturalistic philosophy and empirical science, who opposes the former when it comes cloaked in the authority of the latter.
I for one in my own personal investigation, see too many holes in Darwin's theory that no longer add up. The fossil record, which has grown greatly since Darwin's days, continues to promote statis more than anything else. In limited ways the fossil record has shown change within limits of certain phenotypes, but neither the fossil record nor any other empirical evidence has in any way come close to showing the means by which the phenotypes came into existence in the 1st place.
** Material attributed/borrowed/altered from a book I'm currently reading entitled "Darwin on Trial" by Phillip Johnson - highly recommended reading for anyone IMHO.
Last edited by cjbaldw; 09/05/05 06:48 AM.
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