Wafe, welcome to the board,
Take for example evolution which is considered a 'fact' by most biologists. The truth of the matter is that many are now comming to the conclusion that creation has greater weight than evolution.
many? how "many" is "many", if i may ask?
if you have studied scientific methodology as you say, then surely you will understand that an argument from numbers is not an indication that a theory is factually true. however, since you bring it up, we will get into it.
www.discovery.org/articleFiles/PDFs/100ScientistsAd.pdf shows that many scientist are not convinced that it was the 'fact' it was a century ago.
there might be a couple hundred there at the most, but the authors of that pdf do not cite their sources, or even the total number. and apart from the fact that people at the Discovery institute have been shown to be intellectually dishonest, and include scientists in this list that are merely critical of certain aspects of the theory of evolution, not the theory as a whole, there may not be even that many.
as you will probably know from your research into this area of debate that according to a 1991 gallup poll in the united states, there are over 480,000 scientists *working in relevant fields to evolutionary theory* (biologists, geologists, anthropologists, geneticists etc, NOT engineering, computer science, theology etc). in that poll, only 0.15% OF THE 480,000 WERE CREATIONISTS. the remaining 99+% were not. and this does not take into consideration the western european countries where you would expect to find even higher numbers of secular thinking scientists in relevant fields.
if you say there are "many", please provide a source that actually gives a number and we will compare notes. my sources are:
Edwards v. Aguillard. 1986. U.S. Supreme Court amicus curiae brief of 72 Nobel laureates (and others). (Case 482 U.S. 578, 1987) http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/edwards-v-aguillard/amicus1.html
NAS. 1999. (see above)
NCSE. n.d., Voices for evolution. http://www.ncseweb.org/article.asp?category=2
Robinson, B. A. 1995. Public beliefs about evolution and creation. http://www.religioustolerance.org/ev_publi.htm
Witham, Larry. 1997. Many scientists see God's hand in evolution. Reports of the National Center for Science Education 17(6): 33. http://www.ncseweb.org/resources/rncse_content/vol17/5319_many_scientists_see_god39s__12_30_1899.asp
Like all things in science, it is based on speculation ( Hypothesis ) and repeating an expriement to come to a conclusion. This of course is flawed thinking as no one on earth has all of the knowledge to say that these observations were valid ten million years ago (know anyone that was alive then?)
uh, wafe, there is a mode of discovery called CSI. have you ever heard of it? how do you think investigators gain such granular detail into crimes that they were not there to witness either? this is how paleontology works. plus it works within the evolutionary theoretical framework, making it falsifiable. there is nothing "flawed" in this at all. and then there is genetics, which is another branch of science that has independently verified the theory of evolution by natural selection. the only thing i find flawed here is your ability to make bold statements that presume to have a knowledge of scientific menthodology backing them, when it is obvious they don't.
so, let's see, hypothetical speculation is somehow flawed because it does not take into account the Genesis story? or just because it's speculation? but i thought that you said you studied a lot of science? so how is it that you miss the point that hypothesis is a main component of scientific method? and that when i hypothesis is shown to be factual over and over again, it gets to join other hypotheses with the same credibility under an umbrella called a theory. now, because all the testable hypotheses have been shown to be factual, then the greater abstraction of the theory can be said to be "factual" too, since it all works together in this place we like to call "manifest reality".
The truth is that scientist are willing to take things on faith (greek pistis) just like theologists.
why? because you say so and you provided us all with the greek translation of "faith"? HA! please show us where in scientific method scientists are acting on FAITH, and not educated estimations in developing FURTHER HYPOTHESES?? thank you.
To show this point, when Dawkins was asked why he believed evolution despite the evidence agaisnt it, he explained more or less 'I can't see the processes but all the evidence points to it' or words to that effect.
this smacks of a misquote to me dude. where did you get that? first of all, why would dawkins answer blindly a loaded question like that? dawkins would not entertain the supposed question before dealing with the fallacy in the question, namely that there is evidence "against" evolution.
i dunno Wafe, you don't seem to have your thinking cap on, sorry. when was the last time that you had such strong eye sight that you were able to view biological processes on the microscopic level? OF COURSE dawkins cannot see such processes. again, CSI my friend. unless of course you have come up with a better method that does not include reading the bible for answers?
The same is true for theologist the difference is many scientists are too arrogant to admit it
it's not arrogance Wafe. it's arrogant to ask scientists to answer questions that they know are not real questions. i am yet to see "faith" play a part in science either. it's not arrogance. just a technical fact.
if you disagree, then please show me where in scientific method, "faith" is used.
tetra
