Creationism IS a 'Cult'ural Movement!

So Jon, how many experiments have you yourself done? Is that how you got your ideas, or do you read books and go to seminars and all that? I don't buy this urban legend about some sacred 'scientific method'.

Ok, this starts down a familiar path. Would you like to take a shot at telling us what this standard methodology is and how you know it's reliable? The latter point (reliability) is really the essential question here. And why does it change? Is there something more reliable than the scientific method that tells us when it needs to be modified?

Ok, let's start here: Is this a freudian slip? Here's the dictionary.com definition of tenet: "any opinion, principle, doctrine, dogma, etc., esp. one held as true by members of a profession, group, or movement." So we know the scientific methods of prediction and replication are true because they are held by the scientific community? (Whatever that is!)
I'm not just being pedantic here. The anti-creationists take great comfort from the idea that they have some superior method of discovering truth and I think it's a very serious logic fallacy.Now I hope you're not going to make me work too hard on this, but can you acknowledge that the study of evolution does not fit your wiki definition of scientific method in a number of important aspects? Yes, discovered how? Does the scientific method check itself? If so, it is unproven by the scientific method's own standards. If by some other method, what is that method? Reliability in the commercial world is generally defined as the ability to meet some pre-defined criteria. If you make the same mistakes each time you'll probably get the same results, so this isn't a very useful definition of reliable. This really isn't a very useful definition either. It really doesn't mean anything more than 'i like the results'. It produces useful products perhaps, or something like that, but it doesn't speak to science being in any sense 'true'.

Ok, if you mean that science has to factor in human thought I'm with you 100%. But that is saying that science is not pure method. If people want to define 'scientific method' as a set of loosely defined tools for thinking people to use in various inquiries, or something like that, I have no problem. In that case it's obvious that the human thought is the important element, and creationists and evolutionists could start to have a conversation. But if you're going to define scientific method as something that rules out the existence of God, or a creator in general, than you had better be able to define scientific method very, very precisely. Again, useful and accurate are two very different things. But I don't really buy the premise anyway, if you take a realistic look at how useful things have been invented or discovered. It usually wasn't science as you're defining it.

Hmmm, a very good question, actually. Yes, we must, because 'method' implies a reductionist kind of thing, that all reality must fit in some overarching pattern. The pattern itself would not be subject to the scientific method. For instance, science cannot comment on why the laws of nature are regular, except to say there could be no science if they weren't. So for the creationist God is the overarching pattern and cannot be reduced. He is not composed of something else. So it's more like the creationist saying nothing else makes sense unless you assume God. You must examine the evidence to see if it fits the concept, but you can't expect to 'prove' God, because that assumes something more fundamental than God. Whatever your worldview you must eventually get to things that 'just are'. We can never *prove* gravity exists everywhere, for instance, and we may never find what time or space are composed of - they may not be composed of anything but be essential realities.

Yes, I did answer it, but I say gently, I think you missed it because you've got method on the brain. 'Method' can really only apply to things already known. You need to take a step back and think about what I'm saying: Is there, first of all, really any such thing as the scientific method, and if so, what are it's limits. Must everything be subject to a method? There's a big difference, you know, between forensic science and finding out where the party is this weekend.

Of course it does! See, this is exactly what I'm talking about, this fantasy definition of science that totally ignores what happens in the real world of science.

You asked the question. Let's not do the subtle thing where we dismiss another's thinking because it doesn't fit the topic. Because this is a microcosm of the science-in-school thing where we can't teach creationism because it's not science so it has to be taught in some other classroom. Doesn't matter whether it's true or not.
So I think I mentioned briefly the basic approach the creationist must take to see if he is right: He must see if the available evidence fits the theory. We don't have the option of replicating creation, you know?
So here's some sample evidence/thinking:
1) If there is a creator, has he revealed himself. One obvious possibility is the Bible. Does it fit the known facts? Like if you extrapolate a graph of human population growth does it seem like it might correspond with the Genesis 1 account? You've got other evidences for the Bible like archeological confirmation and fulfilled prophecies.
2) Do we see evidence of intelligent design in nature. If there is a God we would recognize him rather than discover him, so do we see an image of our own intelligence in nature. Obviously yes, what we call life is almost infinitely beyond anything that we could do on purpose. Those who try to find flaws in the design of life only embarrass themselves with their lack of design savvy (I'm an engineer).
3) The evidence of my own consciousness, which is really the first and most reliable evidence any of us have. It's not really relevant whether there is a physical basis for consciousness, which there obviously is. If it is true that I am capable of objective thought, which I must assume I am, how is that possible. It cannot be explained *merely* as physical phenomena or else I am not capable of objective thought, only conditional response.So how you approach this sort of thing is dependant on whether you really want to know the truth or not. I'm sure the most of you have been sufficiently indoctrinated in the scientific method that you can win the debate class, but you may not know where the party is going to be this weekend.

Oh, and would you make people sick on purpose so you could replicate your experiments and call it the scientific method? See, the method must fit the question. You might make animals sick but on the humans you'd try to decipher the existing data.

Ever hear of the Scopes trial?

No, my point is that there is no such thing as the 'scientific method'. I have to overstate the case a little because it definitely is a religious thing to a lot of you guys. It's like walking into a church and saying "I don't believe the Bible" and people start quoting verses from the Bible to prove you wrong. So to the original point of the thread, if creationism is a cult, science is every bit as much so. If you're going to dispute me, please argue from outside of science, since science is the question here (to me - I don't believe in it).

You'd have to tell me how it's anything other than conditional response. Your eyes see patterns on your computer screen and through a very complex electro-chemical series of reactions your fingers press keys on your keyboard. Is it something more than that, and if so, what?

I know there's a few responses to me out there, but I've got to run and do some paying work. Later.

Shoot, but I'm only grabbing a quick lunch break here.

Hey Phat, I think I lost the train of thought here. But remember, I'm not arguing that science is not useful, that is, doesn't produce results that we like, such as the bridge not falling down. Basically I'm arguing that if you have developed a methodology for building bridges there is no guarantee that method is useful for anything else. I'm trying to take the spotlight off method and put it on results. If we have to argue whether creationism is science we at best waste our time because science, as I'm vainly trying to demonstrate, has no hard definition. However, if we can simply argue about whether there is a God (with people who really want to know) and whether he created the world; that's an entirely different thing. In the latter case we start with the question and try to find suitable evidence and/or techniques for answering it.
Hope that's not a total non-sequiter...