Register | Sign In


Understanding through Discussion


EvC Forum active members: 65 (9162 total)
2 online now:
Newest Member: popoi
Post Volume: Total: 915,815 Year: 3,072/9,624 Month: 917/1,588 Week: 100/223 Day: 11/17 Hour: 0/0


Thread  Details

Email This Thread
Newer Topic | Older Topic
  
Author Topic:   Question About the Universe
NoNukes
Inactive Member


Message 121 of 373 (740020)
10-30-2014 8:40 PM
Reply to: Message 120 by Colbard
10-30-2014 8:03 PM


Re: Guessing about guesses
When I first studied evolution, I found out that the horse was older than the earth, courtesy Encyclopedia Britannica, which gave the age of both.
Unless you were looking at an extremely old version of Encyclopedia Britannica, I find your claim rather difficult to credit. At no point during your lifetime was there a scientific consensus that the age of the earth was less than a billion years old. If in fact a 20th century edition of the Britannica made such a claim, the claim was incorrect.
I have watched the progress of science fairly closely, and nearly every one of their conclusions, far less so in the medical fields, is wrong.
Sure, bro. Then why can you not recite that progress/history correctly, having watched it closely?

Under a government which imprisons any unjustly, the true place for a just man is also in prison. Thoreau: Civil Disobedience (1846)
I have never met a man so ignorant that I couldn't learn something from him. Galileo Galilei
If there is no struggle, there is no progress. Those who profess to favor freedom, and deprecate agitation, are men who want crops without plowing up the ground, they want rain without thunder and lightning. Frederick Douglass

This message is a reply to:
 Message 120 by Colbard, posted 10-30-2014 8:03 PM Colbard has not replied

  
Percy
Member
Posts: 22391
From: New Hampshire
Joined: 12-23-2000
Member Rating: 5.2


Message 122 of 373 (740042)
10-31-2014 7:02 AM
Reply to: Message 113 by Colbard
10-30-2014 8:18 AM


Hi Colbard,
You're saying, "Science could be wrong," and the proper response is, "Yes, of course science could be wrong."
Whether science is actually wrong concerning any specific theory depends upon whether you have an answer for the next question: "How is science wrong?" You need a better answer than merely repeating, "Science could be wrong."
--Percy

This message is a reply to:
 Message 113 by Colbard, posted 10-30-2014 8:18 AM Colbard has not replied

  
Percy
Member
Posts: 22391
From: New Hampshire
Joined: 12-23-2000
Member Rating: 5.2


Message 123 of 373 (740043)
10-31-2014 8:12 AM
Reply to: Message 120 by Colbard
10-30-2014 8:03 PM


Re: Guessing about guesses
Colbard writes:
When I first studied evolution, I found out that the horse was older than the earth, courtesy Encyclopedia Britannica, which gave the age of both.
I doubt this very much. My guess is that you're referring to the debate between geologists and physicists in the late 19th century, when Lord Kelvin refined his thermodynamic calculations and arrived at an age of the earth between 20 and 40 million years. This figure was never accepted by geologists and paleontologists who were observing the evidence of age first hand. Radioactive sources of heat were unknown in Kelvin's time, hence his incorrect calculations. Ironically, radioactivity not only caused Kelvin's incorrect calculations, it also provided the dating methods proving geologists also wrong. The Earth was not only older than Kelvin believed, it was even far older than the geologists themselves believed. Science gradually figured all this out.
Another example, when I began school, the Australian Aborigines had been in here for 3,000 years, and were discussed in the flora and fauna section of geography. They were still just animals. Very similar to the US and its imported slaves.
Some people are racists, and scientists are people, but in any event, according to science we're all "just animals".
Four years later, the Aborigines had been here for 6000 years, later increasing to 10,000, then 20,000, then 30,000, then 40,000 and remained official there for a while, then 60,000 years and so on.
Those dates you're citing must be for the evidence of earliest occupation. Few scientists would make the mistake of believing they had found the first Aborigine to step off the first boat. More recent refinements to the dating are based on genetic studies, an entirely different approach that yields results consistent with the findings of archaeology.
Their [scientist's] opinions are fallible.
Of course they are. So are yours. Differing opinions are settled by examining the evidence, and gathering more evidence if necessary.
For example, in the fifties and sixties, some of them claimed that smoking is actually good for you.
I think you're confusing advertising with science. Cigarette companies had full blown advertising campaigns that included supposed claims by doctors and scientists. This quote from the abstract to a paper about the role of the image of the physician in cigarette advertising reminds us of what was actually true at the time, that the scientific evidence against smoking was already strong and growing by the 1950's (The Physician in US Cigarette Advertisements, 1930—1953):
quote:
In the 1930s and 1940s, smoking became the norm for both men and women in the United States, and a majority of physicians smoked. At the same time, there was rising public anxiety about the health risks of cigarette smoking. One strategic response of tobacco companies was to devise advertising referring directly to physicians. As ad campaigns featuring physicians developed through the early 1950s, tobacco executives used the doctor image to assure the consumer that their respective brands were safe.
These advertisements also suggested that the individual physicians’ clinical judgment should continue to be the arbiter of the harms of cigarette smoking even as systematic health evidence accumulated. However, by 1954, industry strategists deemed physician images in advertisements no longer credible in the face of growing public concern about the health evidence implicating cigarettes.
Colbard writes:
They insisted on a high protein diet with lots of meat, milk products and eggs. people still believe that and are dying early.
In this case I think you're confusing diet advocates with science. Teasing out the effects of various components of diet are notoriously difficult, we still have a very long way to go in this area. Those pushing any particular diet will always try to find supporting scientific papers to cite, but when you actually read the paper you'll find the support usually isn't there.
Asbestos was harmless. DDT was sprayed over people while they were still in the public swimming pools, and meat products were drenched with formaldehyde to keep them fresh. If an atomic explosion occurred, all you had to do is "duck and cover."
Scientific research was instrumental in identifying and characterizing these hazards.
I have watched the progress of science fairly closely, and nearly every one of their conclusions, far less so in the medical fields, is wrong.
You're surrounded by the effects of the progress of science.
For instance, I have never believed the black hole theory, and now they are finally waking up to it.
No one is waking up to your take on black holes.
--Percy

This message is a reply to:
 Message 120 by Colbard, posted 10-30-2014 8:03 PM Colbard has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 125 by Colbard, posted 10-31-2014 9:54 AM Percy has replied

  
nwr
Member
Posts: 6408
From: Geneva, Illinois
Joined: 08-08-2005
Member Rating: 5.1


Message 124 of 373 (740044)
10-31-2014 9:08 AM
Reply to: Message 120 by Colbard
10-30-2014 8:03 PM


Re: Guessing about guesses
When I first studied evolution, I found out that the horse was older than the earth, courtesy Encyclopedia Britannica, which gave the age of both.
I remember a time when the earth was believed to be around 2 billion years old. I do not recall ever hearing that horses are older than that. Perhaps that was one of the stories that creationists were telling back then.
Another example, when I began school, the Australian Aborigines had been in here for 3,000 years, and were discussed in the flora and fauna section of geography. They were still just animals. Very similar to the US and its imported slaves.
I also do not remember a time when aborigines were believed to have only been there for 3,000 years.
And, yes, I grew up in Australia and was attending school there in the 1940s
It is true that Australians looked down on aborigines, but I don't think I would compare that to US and slavery. A better comparison with US slavery, would be the import of Kanakas (South Sea islanders) to work as slaves in the Queensland sugar plantations.

Fundamentalism - the anti-American, anti-Christian branch of American Christianity

This message is a reply to:
 Message 120 by Colbard, posted 10-30-2014 8:03 PM Colbard has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 126 by Colbard, posted 10-31-2014 10:02 AM nwr has replied

  
Colbard
Member (Idle past 3391 days)
Posts: 300
From: Australia
Joined: 08-31-2014


Message 125 of 373 (740050)
10-31-2014 9:54 AM
Reply to: Message 123 by Percy
10-31-2014 8:12 AM


Re: Guessing about guesses
Percy writes:
No one is waking up to your take on black holes.
The whole point of your post is...?

This message is a reply to:
 Message 123 by Percy, posted 10-31-2014 8:12 AM Percy has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 127 by Percy, posted 10-31-2014 10:21 AM Colbard has not replied

  
Colbard
Member (Idle past 3391 days)
Posts: 300
From: Australia
Joined: 08-31-2014


Message 126 of 373 (740052)
10-31-2014 10:02 AM
Reply to: Message 124 by nwr
10-31-2014 9:08 AM


Re: Guessing about guesses
So somehow we ought to go by what is officially guessed about the universe, rather than what some individual or small group might have on it.
And we are not to assume that because the big numbers will change their minds in the future, that what we have today is not true.
Wow.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 124 by nwr, posted 10-31-2014 9:08 AM nwr has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 128 by New Cat's Eye, posted 10-31-2014 11:33 AM Colbard has not replied
 Message 129 by nwr, posted 10-31-2014 2:47 PM Colbard has not replied
 Message 130 by Percy, posted 10-31-2014 4:19 PM Colbard has not replied

  
Percy
Member
Posts: 22391
From: New Hampshire
Joined: 12-23-2000
Member Rating: 5.2


Message 127 of 373 (740053)
10-31-2014 10:21 AM
Reply to: Message 125 by Colbard
10-31-2014 9:54 AM


Re: Guessing about guesses
Colbard writes:
The whole point of your post is...?
You presented a lot of confused ideas characterizing science as inept and wrong, so most of my post was spent correcting you.
My last point was just reminding you that newly explored possibilities about black holes are not related in any way to your own ideas. Science is not "finally waking up" to your ideas about black holes. Science is doing what it always tries to do, extending our knowledge of the universe and how it works.
--Percy

This message is a reply to:
 Message 125 by Colbard, posted 10-31-2014 9:54 AM Colbard has not replied

  
New Cat's Eye
Inactive Member


Message 128 of 373 (740056)
10-31-2014 11:33 AM
Reply to: Message 126 by Colbard
10-31-2014 10:02 AM


Re: Guessing about guesses
So somehow we ought to go by what is officially guessed about the universe, rather than what some individual or small group might have on it.
Well, it works, doesn't it?
Surely you cannot deny that humans have enjoyed awesome advances in technology thanks to this scientific approach that you are denigrating.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 126 by Colbard, posted 10-31-2014 10:02 AM Colbard has not replied

  
nwr
Member
Posts: 6408
From: Geneva, Illinois
Joined: 08-08-2005
Member Rating: 5.1


Message 129 of 373 (740068)
10-31-2014 2:47 PM
Reply to: Message 126 by Colbard
10-31-2014 10:02 AM


Re: Guessing about guesses
So somehow we ought to go by what is officially guessed about the universe, rather than what some individual or small group might have on it.
This is absurd.
You made assertions about the consensus of scientists, but your assertions appear to be wrong.
You are, of course, entitled to disagree with the scientific consensus. But you are not entitled to misrepresent it.
And we are not to assume that because the big numbers will change their minds in the future, that what we have today is not true.
You seem to think it a fault of science, that it is not a rigid evidence denying dogma.
It is usually considered one of the strong points of science, that when scientists develop better methods they can change what were previous tentative conclusions.

Fundamentalism - the anti-American, anti-Christian branch of American Christianity

This message is a reply to:
 Message 126 by Colbard, posted 10-31-2014 10:02 AM Colbard has not replied

  
Percy
Member
Posts: 22391
From: New Hampshire
Joined: 12-23-2000
Member Rating: 5.2


(1)
Message 130 of 373 (740075)
10-31-2014 4:19 PM
Reply to: Message 126 by Colbard
10-31-2014 10:02 AM


Re: Guessing about guesses
Colbard writes:
So somehow we ought to go by what is officially guessed about the universe, rather than what some individual or small group might have on it.
As I said before, a theory is not a guess. You justified this characterization of theories as guesses by saying that science could be wrong about a theory, and I'm sure we all agree with you, but you can't challenge anything, let alone an accepted scientific theory with its carefully reviewed evidence, just by saying, "It could be wrong." You have to show how it is wrong.
And we are not to assume that because the big numbers will change their minds in the future, that what we have today is not true.
Science is tentative, always ready to change theory in response to new evidence or improved insight, but currently accepted theory represents our best understanding of the world in which we live. There is no better way than science of understanding this universe.
--Percy
Edited by Percy, : Grammar.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 126 by Colbard, posted 10-31-2014 10:02 AM Colbard has not replied

  
NoNukes
Inactive Member


Message 131 of 373 (740081)
10-31-2014 6:44 PM
Reply to: Message 116 by Colbard
10-30-2014 8:27 AM


I am objecting to the opinion of those who say that if something goes well using Maths, then it must be fact.
While your objection has merit, it is incomplete. Mathematics is just a way of expressing a theory and its consequences. The math allows us to be absolutely sure about the consequences of a theory.
So with regard to theories about the universe, mathematical support is the bare minimum. There is simply no reason to accept your or anyone else's theory or speculation on black holes, the age of the universe or the age of the earth where such a theory or speculation does not include some way for others to check whether they are right.

Under a government which imprisons any unjustly, the true place for a just man is also in prison. Thoreau: Civil Disobedience (1846)
I have never met a man so ignorant that I couldn't learn something from him. Galileo Galilei
If there is no struggle, there is no progress. Those who profess to favor freedom, and deprecate agitation, are men who want crops without plowing up the ground, they want rain without thunder and lightning. Frederick Douglass

This message is a reply to:
 Message 116 by Colbard, posted 10-30-2014 8:27 AM Colbard has not replied

  
Colbard
Member (Idle past 3391 days)
Posts: 300
From: Australia
Joined: 08-31-2014


Message 132 of 373 (740085)
10-31-2014 7:49 PM


A general reply to the above posts,
There is nothing wrong with having a systematic and methodical approach, which many scientists are true to, but it is not all that simple and innocent and truthful as you might imagine.
Edited by Colbard, : No reason given.

Replies to this message:
 Message 133 by NoNukes, posted 10-31-2014 10:49 PM Colbard has not replied
 Message 134 by Percy, posted 11-01-2014 8:03 AM Colbard has replied
 Message 135 by New Cat's Eye, posted 11-01-2014 9:07 AM Colbard has not replied

  
NoNukes
Inactive Member


Message 133 of 373 (740086)
10-31-2014 10:49 PM
Reply to: Message 132 by Colbard
10-31-2014 7:49 PM


There is nothing wrong with having a systematic and methodical approach, which many scientists are true to, but it is not all that simple and innocent and truthful as you might imagine.
So you believe you have an approach that works better than the scientific method? What might that be?

Under a government which imprisons any unjustly, the true place for a just man is also in prison. Thoreau: Civil Disobedience (1846)
I have never met a man so ignorant that I couldn't learn something from him. Galileo Galilei
If there is no struggle, there is no progress. Those who profess to favor freedom, and deprecate agitation, are men who want crops without plowing up the ground, they want rain without thunder and lightning. Frederick Douglass

This message is a reply to:
 Message 132 by Colbard, posted 10-31-2014 7:49 PM Colbard has not replied

  
Percy
Member
Posts: 22391
From: New Hampshire
Joined: 12-23-2000
Member Rating: 5.2


Message 134 of 373 (740098)
11-01-2014 8:03 AM
Reply to: Message 132 by Colbard
10-31-2014 7:49 PM


Colbard writes:
There is nothing wrong with having a systematic and methodical approach, which many scientists are true to, but it is not all that simple and innocent and truthful as you might imagine.
Few things are "simple and innocent and truthful" where people are involved, but if you have a method better than science for studying the natural world then let's hear it.
Ya know, you could be wrong.
--Percy

This message is a reply to:
 Message 132 by Colbard, posted 10-31-2014 7:49 PM Colbard has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 137 by Colbard, posted 11-02-2014 1:25 AM Percy has replied

  
New Cat's Eye
Inactive Member


Message 135 of 373 (740102)
11-01-2014 9:07 AM
Reply to: Message 132 by Colbard
10-31-2014 7:49 PM


There is nothing wrong with having a systematic and methodical approach, which many scientists are true to, but it is not all that simple and innocent and truthful as you might imagine.
Nor is it as complex and guilty and fallacious as you seem to be implying.
If science isn't uncovering truth, then why is it working so well?

This message is a reply to:
 Message 132 by Colbard, posted 10-31-2014 7:49 PM Colbard has not replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 136 by Dogmafood, posted 11-01-2014 9:11 AM New Cat's Eye has seen this message but not replied

  
Newer Topic | Older Topic
Jump to:


Copyright 2001-2023 by EvC Forum, All Rights Reserved

™ Version 4.2
Innovative software from Qwixotic © 2024