Standards of Evidence

Why do the scientifically minded amongst us degenerate into a seething, spluttering mass of apoplectic indignation when our reasoned and physical evidentially supported arguments are dismissed as obviously and trivially refuted with reference to biblical passages by creationists??Why does the creationist shrug their shoulders with indifference at yet another atheistically inspired interpretation of evidence when a specific measurable prediction derived from theory is experimentally verified??Are the two camps talking the same language in terms of reliability of evidence?It would appear not.Yet objectively defining what is, and what is not, good evidence really should not be dependant on the point of view being expressed.
Agreement should, in theory, be possible if objective criteria are being applied.So what are the characteristics of good reliable evidence??What are the characteristics of poor unreliable evidence??Do the characteristics of evidence you have chosen apply outside the EvC debate (e.g. in the courtroom, when solving a mechanical problem or when applied to the social sciences)?Whilst specific examples are inevitable and perfectly valid in any such discussions I want this to be about WHY particular FORMS of evidence are better or worse than other kinds of evidence NOT exclusively about one or two specific examples.Simply defining evidence in such a way as to suit your particular argument, whether creationist or evolutionist, is not what this thread is intended to be about.Reasoned argument as to why one form of evidence should be considered a superior indicator of objective truth than another form of evidence IS the intended aim of this thread.This topic has been prompted by the recent thread “Most convincing evidence for creation theory” where the validity of the evidence presented was repeatedly called into question.

Agreed. But the evolutionist almost always asserts that his special pleading is not as such, but objective. So idealistically your blue box statement is a goal that requires specifics.Objective criteria is subjective in the Creation-Evolution debate since Creationist presuppositions are pro-supernaturalistic and Evolution presuppositions are pro-materialistic.With this said what do you propose?Ray

It would seem to be of promotable "Proposed New Topics" (PNT) quality, so I'm going to move it to the "Is It Science?" forum.But this should have been submitted to the PNT forum. Anything that ties into the creationism/evolution debate should be channeled through the PNT.Adminnemooseus

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Thread copied to the Standards of Evidence thread in the Is It Science? forum, this copy of the thread has been closed.