Evolution is not science

Welcome, City.Just to get the ball rolling:

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Science limits its focus on the present.

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Science is limited only to what can be observed. The past can be observed. The past leaves evidence that can be examined in the present. Just like the composition and state of the center of the earth; the earth's core cannot be directly observed. However, its state and composition has effects that can be observed here on the surface. Likewise, the past cannot be directly observed; however, the past has left effects that can be observed in the present.-

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There may be evidence to back up these "facts" but that evidence can easily be re-interpreted.

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I do not believe in this postmodern vision. I do not believe that evidence can be interpreted any way that you want, and that one can just believe anything one wants to believe.I believe that there is a reality that exists regardless of what you or I believe about it. There was a past history that occurred, regardless of what you or I think about it. And events in the past leave traces that can be examined in the present. Not all possible past histories are consistent with the evidence that exists. We can use this evidence to rule out possible scenarios for the past, and can even come to definite conclusions about the present.-The logical conclusion of your viewpoint is that we can believe anything we want about events that we have not witnessed ourselves, and can simply reinterpret evidence anyway that we want to confirm our beliefs. That is madness. I think most of us will agree that we can know some things very definitely without directly observing them. Otherwise, the only thing we can really know about is what we see in front of us, with our own eyes, and that anything else in the world, whether the earth is flat, or whether there is no such country as Australia, or that the earth's core is made of ice cream, are all equally plausible, depending only on how we want to "interpret" the evidence.Edited by Chiroptera, : typos -- lots of 'em

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Actually, if their god makes better pancakes, I'm totally switching sides. -- Charley the Australopithecine

I think that crash's CSI analogy is a valid point and has a lot of potential is explaining how science can help us come to definite (yet tentative) conclusions about events we have not witnessed.

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Actually, if their god makes better pancakes, I'm totally switching sides. -- Charley the Australopithecine

Hi, Jon.

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Conceivably there could be an alternative interpretation that accounts for all the evidence.

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Indeed. But the point is that the theory of evolution is not just something people want to believe, and people aren't just forcing some interpretation onto the evidence to justify this. Evolution is a natural, reasonable inference based on the data that we have.Unlike, say, young earth creationism. The evidence is pretty uniequivocal that the earth, the universe, and the history of life is billions of years old, that the species evolved from earlier species, and that there was no global flood that occurred in historic times. One has to force a different interpretation onto the evidence (and usually one has to ignore huge swaths of it) in order to maintain a belief in a literal Genesis that one is not willing to drop.

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Actually, if their god makes better pancakes, I'm totally switching sides. -- Charley the Australopithecine

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The alleged EVIDENCE is observable. But do you have a time machine? Did you actually SEE the evolution of an unicellular cell to the modern man?

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We accept the existence of many things that we do not, or cannot, see directly based on evidence. You may have noticed, I was the first to respond to your OP and I responded to this very point.

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Actually, if their god makes better pancakes, I'm totally switching sides. -- Charley the Australopithecine

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And there are many creationist scientists and many more who question evolution

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And not one of them understands either the theory of evolution or the science that supports it.

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Actually, if their god makes better pancakes, I'm totally switching sides. -- Charley the Australopithecine

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Nevertheless, the general theory of evolution is not observable, testable OR repeatable.

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Actually, the theory of evolution is observable and testable, and the observations and tests are repeatable, just like any science requires.-

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The composition of the Earth, however, can be concluded by the observation of the transmission of waves.

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Now you're getting it! Even though the core of the earth is not directly observable, we can nonetheless "observe it" by examining its effects on phenomena that can be observed. It is testable in that once someone has a theory on the composition and physical state of the core, one can predict further phenomena that should be observed if the theory is true. And these observations and test are repeatable.In the same way, the history of life on earth can be observed by observing the effects it has left in the present. The theory of common descent (which is what I suspect you are objecting to) can be tested by predicting phenomena which should be observed in present times if the theory were true. And these observations and tests are repeatable.The theory of evolution, the theory of common descent, is observable, testable, and repeatable exactly like the "theory of the iron/nickel core with a solid inner core surrounded by a liquid outer core" is observable, testable, and repeatable.One is science every bit as much as the other.

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Actually, if their god makes better pancakes, I'm totally switching sides. -- Charley the Australopithecine

Quote mining (the taking of peoples' quotes out of context) is usually a sign that one's argument is pretty weak.-

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Infamous Charles Darwin quote which I'm sure all of you have heard:

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Not much was known about the fossil record in Darwin's time. That is why the bulk of the evidence in favor of evolution is not fossils, and, in my opinion, the best evidence is not the fossils at all. Of course, now in the early years of the 21st century there are a lot of nice fossil evidence of the major evolutionary transitions.-

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Stephen Jay Gould (Professor of Geology and Paleontology, Harvard University)

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I've actually read SJG's works. You should, too, then you would understand what is writing about. In fact, SGJ is noting that there is a lack of fossil evidence for microevolution -- but that is no big deal since creationists already accept microevolution. However, SJG and Niles Elderedge came up with their theory of Punctuated Equilibrium because they noted that there was plenty of fossil evidence for macroevolution.Ironically, it is the part that creationists accept, microevolution, that is missing in the fossil record, but the fossils record macroevolution very nicely.-

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Hubert P. Yockey (Army Pulse Radiation Facility, Aberdeen Proving Ground, Maryland, USA)

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This may be true: there isn't a very good theory yet about the origin of life itself. However, the record is pretty clear about the history of life after it originated.

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Actually, if their god makes better pancakes, I'm totally switching sides. -- Charley the Australopithecine

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Many atheists question evolution because it just doesn't add up.

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This is interesting. Many Bible literalists claim that atheists must believe in evolution in order to justify their atheism.May I quote you when I run into this argument again?

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Actually, if their god makes better pancakes, I'm totally switching sides. -- Charley the Australopithecine

*Ahem*Edited by Chiroptera, : New subtitle.

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Actually, if their god makes better pancakes, I'm totally switching sides. -- Charley the Australopithecine

No, you're not. You never said you thought that evolution doesn't add up. You said that you doubted evolution because if it were true you would end up smoking lots of pot and banging a different chick every night.

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Actually, if their god makes better pancakes, I'm totally switching sides. -- Charley the Australopithecine

If you're going to resurrect an old thread, inkorrekt, you should check to see what the topic is. From the OP:

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"Science is based on repeated Observation"

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this simple statement is ignored by many scientists who accept evolution. Science limits its focus on the present. "Facts" declared about what allegedly happened billions of years ago are not really facts, but strongly-advocated faith points.

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There may be evidence to back up these "facts" but that evidence can easily be re-interpreted.

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So you really should be discussing whether or not evolution counts as a science.And please read the responses to the OP, too, just so you don't repeat the same mistakes that were already answered.

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I've done everything the Bible says, even the stuff that contradicts the other stuff! -- Ned Flanders

Well, I guess the whole thread did go off-topic on its own, so one can't really blame you for replying to what you felt was an interesting post.

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I've done everything the Bible says, even the stuff that contradicts the other stuff! -- Ned Flanders

Ha! Did I call it, or what? In a PNT, a creationist is doing this very thing: This is the logical result of the argument that since we didn't witness the past, we can't be sure that the same physical laws have transpired in the past. This is no different than simple arguing that since we can't witness what the core of the earth is like, then we can't be sure what the core of the earth is actually like.Edited by Chiroptera, : Added link.

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In many respects, the Bible was the world's first Wikipedia article. -- Doug Brown (quoted by Carlin Romano in The Chronicle Review)

Hi, Malangyar. Welcome to EvC. No. For a theory to be scientific, one must be able to make testable predictions from it. Basically, one says, "If this theory is accurate, then we should be able to see this particular phenomenon." Then, if that phenomenon is observed, the theory is considered verified, and further predictions are then made to make additional tests. If the phenomenon is not observed, then one must try to figure out why -- if no explanation is forthcoming, then the theory might be modified, or it might be rejected altogether.

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In many respects, the Bible was the world's first Wikipedia article. -- Doug Brown (quoted by Carlin Romano in The Chronicle Review)

Hi, again, Malangyar. To further explain what science is and how it works, I am going to point you to this thread. In it we discussed a simplified (and somewhat tongue-in-cheek) example of how science tests theories.

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In many respects, the Bible was the world's first Wikipedia article. -- Doug Brown (quoted by Carlin Romano in The Chronicle Review)