Excellent post, and not too long at all. I appreciate very much your willingness to go so in-depth; I for one found it very instructive and helpful in the current debate. All in all, I've discovered some very smart, talented and gifted (and humorous!) folks in this list, on both sides of the fence. Thank you all for enriching my life! Rich --- Canopus56 <canopus56@yahoo.com> wrote:
First, a short apology to listserv participants. This is an overlength and somewhat over the top response to Jim and Don questions.
Jim Cobb wrote on 8/12/2005:
I was surprised to receive zero answers. in follow-up to his earlier 8/9/2005 question: Yes! Being falsfiable is fundamental for a scientific theory. Please tell me, how is SETI falsfiable?
The construction of an experiment to test the falsifible hypothesis that ET exists is a straight-forward proposition and illustrates the difference between the scientific method and faith-based religious-directed inquiry.
Take the negative of the hypothesis - "ET does not exist." Listen for a reasonable period of time using currently available technology covering a reasonable volume of intra-galactic space. If no signals are received, then the negative of the hypothesis is true and the hypothesis is false. The results hold for the volume of space covered by the limit of detection of current radio technology.
A person applying the scientific method must accept the proposition that ET does not exist in the search volume.
The result of faith-based religious-directed inquiry is radically different. Because the faith-based inquirer assumes as matter of faith that a divine creator is the cause of an observed effect, if the faith-based inquirer constructs an experiment that conclusively shows that a divine creator did not cause the effect, the inquirer will properly reject the results of their experiment and continue in their religious faith-based belief in a divine being.
I also asked how one falsifies the current evolutionist theory of abiogenesis, the rise of life from an inanimate chemical stew.
As others have pointed out in this thread, the theory of the creation of life is not an essential claim contained within and is not a necessary condition to the theory of evolution. It has been some time since I've read in this area, but from memory, the key propositions for the theory of evolution are:
1) There are random mutations in the genetic code of organic life.
2) These random mutations in the genetic code cause mutations in characteristics of an organism.
3) Whether those random changes in the characteristics of organisms are expressed in subsequent generations depends on the force of natural selection. Does the randomly created mutation result in a increased survival benefit to the organism that increases the probability the organism will reproduce?
4) Enough changes in the acquired characteristics of a group of organisms can accrue over time that speciation occurs - that is a group of isolated "child" organisms looses the ability to procreate by sexual reproduction with the "parent" group.
The evidence supporting these key warrants does not appear to me to be in a position of such uncertainty that it is time for revolution in scientific thought, or paradigm shift, in the Thomas Kuhn sense of the phrase, to some other theory.
The evidence supporting these basic warrants include:
"1) There are random mutations in the genetic code of organic life."
Such changes can be directly observed in real time in the mutation of organisms that have very short life times, like bacteria and viruses. With short life-times they can be observed across many generations within the life-time of a human being.
"2) These random mutations in the genetic code cause mutations in characteristics of an organism."
Such mutations can be directly observed in high-school level experiments by irradiating the genes of fruit flies.
"3) Whether those random changes in the characteristics of organisms survive to following generations depends on the force of natural selection. Does the randomly created mutation result in a increased survival benefit to the organism that increases the probability the organism will reproduce?"
Darwin's support for his claim was an argument by analogy based on a) artificial selection and b) the extension of the analogy of artificial selection to natural selection using, amongst other examples, the finches of the Galapagos Islands.
In our modern post-industrial world, we sometimes lose touch with the common knowledge of the primarily agarian society of Darwin's day - the reality of artificial selection. It's the process by which man and woman, over thousands of years of husbandry, have selected random mutations in organisms to turn:
- grass into wheat and rye, - water buffalo into Jersey dairy cows, and, - 100 lb. tundra wolves into 8lb. Pekinese dogs.
Jim also wrote on 8/12/2005:
Citation of Darwin's finches as conclusive evidence of speciation induced by natural selection. Someone
else in this discussion has acknowledged that this
is no longer considered by biologists as a legitimate example. Yet it remains in the textbooks; . . .
This is a straw dog argument. Darwin's finches were not considered to be evidence of natural selection progressing to specification - rather the they are evidence of natural selection influencing the acquired characteristics of subsequent generations.
I'd have to dust off and reread my copy of the _Voyage of the Beagle_, but my recollection was and my understanding of the modern interpretation of the theory of evolution is that Darwin was not arguing that the finches of the Galapagos Islands are necessarily an example of the force of natural selection progressing to the stage of speciation.
Rather, the finches of the Galapagos Islands are an illustration of the force of natural selection on random changes in the characteristics of the finches of the Galapagos Islands caused by background genetic mutation. Those randomn mutations that confer an incremental survival benefit under current environmental conditions are "selected" by nature and transmitted to later generations. The end result was the accrual of changes in finch beaks.
As you have indirectly alluded to in other threads, the finches of the Galapagos Islands have been the subject of intensive research by Rosemary and Peter Grant since 1973 and across a period of high environmental stress resulting from the 1983 El Nino event. While speciation did not occur in response to rapid environmental change, Grant and Grant observed natural selection at work in subtle modifications to the size of finch beaks within the life time of a single human being.
Peter and Rosemary Grant's bios at Princeton
http://www.eeb.princeton.edu/FACULTY/Grant_P/grantPeter.html
http://www.eeb.princeton.edu/FACULTY/Grant_R/Grant_BR.html
Papers:
"Evolution of DarwinÂs Finches Caused by a Rare Climatic Event." Grant, B.R. and Grant, P.R. (1993).
Proceedings: Biological Sciences, 251, 111-117.
"Convergent Evolution of Darwin's Finches caused by Introgressive Hybirdization and Selection" Grant et al. (2004) Evolution 58: 1588-99
http://www.eeb.princeton.edu/FACULTY/Grant_P/Evolution_2004.pdf
(continuing their earlier research by looking at the effect of "child" population rebreeding with the "parent" population)
"Bmp4 and Morphological Variations of Beaks in Darwin's Finches" Abzhanov et al. (2004) Science 305: 1462-65
http://www.eeb.princeton.edu/FACULTY/Grant_P/Science_2004.pdf
(discussing a genetic marker associated with finch beak size)
"4) Enough changes in the acquired characteristics of a group of organisms can accrue over time that speciation occurs - that is a group of isolated 'child' organisms looses the ability to procreate by sexual reproduction with the 'parent' group."
Proof is based principally on the geologic record. Speciation, caused by natural selection, is not an event observable within the life-time of a human-being. I'm at a loss as to whether there are any examples of animals modified by human-directed artificial selection that have lost the ability to sexually reproduce with their progenitors.
Jim made some other points on 8/9/2005:
Here are some other items that I think we should question being taught in our high schools: <snip> [1] The fraudulent Haeckel embryonic images. . . . [2] Haekel's biogenetic law, "ontogeny recapitulates
phylogeny." . . . [3] The fraudulent linkage of Haekel's images with
von Baer's laws; [4] Pictures of pepper moths on tree trunks as evidence of natural selection. . . . [3] Citation of Darwin's finches as conclusive evidence of speciation induced by natural selection. . . . Yet it remains in the textbooks; . . .
As valid as these points may or may not be, it does not follow from them that the theory of evolution is so fatally inconsistent with observed facts about the natural world that it is time for a revolution in scientific thought, or a paradigm shift to some other theory. There is no sufficient inconsistency between observed facts and the theory of evolution justifying changing what is currently taught in the Utah primary and secondary science curriculum.
Your points regarding the textbooks being used in Utah high schools support an alternative cause and they suggest an alternative course of social reform:
Utah may be underfunding its primary and secondary educational systems resulting in the education system providing our students with outdated textbooks. Therefore, the taxpayers may wish to debate increasing education funding to assure the most recent, updated textbooks are being provided to Utah's youth. A bill should be introduced into Utah's Legislature entitled the "Evolution Financing Textbook Catch-Up Act of 2005."
Jim also commented on 8/12/2005:
I also asked how one falsifies the current evolutionist theory of abiogenesis, the rise of life from an inanimate chemical stew.
Jim repeated his earlier 8/9/2005 statement that reflected Don Colton's thoughts, who wrote on 8/9/2005 that:
I believe the idea of intelligent design as an explanation for at least the first cells can be readily taught without pointing to any particular religion. It is much more likely than the staggeringly improbable idea that the first cells were created by chance.
If you can produce appropriate affirmative, scientifically testable evidence of a divine causal agent creating life from inanimate chemical stew, then your theories should be given consideration. For example, you could surround a pail of dirt with a prayer group (I'm being serious and not factious here) and, after praying for a reasonable period of time, you could examine the bucket to see if divine intervention created life from inanimate soil. Merely relying on argumentation to ignorance (when all other probable causes are ruled out, then the improbable must be true) is insufficient.
The appropriate faith-based response to such an experiment is to continue the core practice of religion - that the belief in the creator is an act of faith. The appropriate scientific response is suspension of belief until more information can be gathered in the future.
Don, if you were going to construct an affirmative scientific experiment to show a divine cause of the transmutation of inanimate matter into organic life,
how would you proceed?
Don Colton also wrote on 8/9/2005 that:
[1] Huxley, Darwin and Lyle had an agenda: . . . [2] They were all believers in the idea that the epitome of natural selection was the white Englishman of the 19th century. [3] They believed blacks, Asiatics and native Americans were sub-human and lower on the evolutionary scale.
For discussion purposes, I'll accept your proposition that Huxley, Darwin and Lyle did hold those beliefs.
Even if those propositions are true, it does not follow from your attack on the characters of these historical figures that the theory of evolution is so fatally inconsistent with observed facts about the natural world that it is that it is time for a revolution in scientific thought, or a paradigm shift to some other faith-based religious-directed theory like intelligent design. Such attacks on the characters of historical persons do not show that the theory of evolution is so inconsistent with the observed natural world sufficient to justify changing what is currently taught in the Utah primary and secondary science curriculum.
The real focus of whether the theory of evolution should be accepted as the best scientific explanation of certain observations about the natural world is the strength of the connection of the physical evidence with the claims of the theory. Sometimes deconstructing the motivations of the primary participants in revolutions of scientific thought (or any other historical event) provides additional illumination on the matter under discussion. But in general, the theory of evolution has to rest on how well the theory explains the physical evidence and not on the moral character of its first proponents over 100 years ago.
For example, I believe that Thomas Jefferson most probably had sex with Sally Hemmings while she was still technically a minor. The fact that Thomas Jefferson may have been a pediophile does not change the inherent "correctness" of the Preamble to the Declaration of Independence or balance-of-powers structure in the Constitution. Similarly, some religions have held the belief that negros were inferior beings whose skin color reflected a mark of disapproval by a divine being, and therefore they were not entitled to equal participation in religious practices or equal respect as human beings. Such beliefs and practices, which go to moral character of the proponent, are generally not accepted as proof that a divine being does not exist.
Conversely, attacks on the character of Huxley and Darwin do not prove that the theory of evolution is inconsistent with observable facts in nature.
These concepts [the racist and social Darwinistic views of Huxley, Darwin and Lyle] were readily adapted by Adolph Hitler to his program of extermination of "sub-humans". Evolutionary ideas applies to societies by dictators including Lenin and Stalin have had horrible results.
Yes, the perverse borrowing of Darwin's biological theory of evolution by the cultural movement of Social Darwinism is one of mankind's darkest hours. Darwin's biological theory of evolution was hijacked and misused by others in the United States to bloster the pre-existing beliefs regarding manifest density and to justify the pre-existing genocidal extermination of possibly up to 30 million Native Americans.
Capitalists, like J.P. Morgan and Andrew Carneige, relied on Social Darwinsim to condemn a couple of generations of children, as little as 6 years old, to labor in the Pennsylvannia coal fields instead of attending elementary school. Such American examples showed Hilter and Stalin the way in the application of Social Darwinistic philosophy to dominate people. The evil of Social Darwinism persists to this day in class stratification in American society, i.e. - the belief by some wealthy persons that they are inherently superior and more worthy than the less wealthy.
Having read the _Voyage of the Beagle_ and the _Origin of the Species_, my sense of the author behind the book is one who would have been equally revolted by the subsequent misuse of his theories as you and I are. History has many examples of scientists' discoveries being misused and abused. Einstein and Oppenheimer come to mind. The subsequent misuse of the atomic weapons by dark historical currents during the Cold War does not change the scientific reality of the theory of atom or quantum mechanics.
In short, it does not follow from the fact that J.P. Morgan, Andrew Carnegie, Stalin and Lenin were not nice people (who perverted the biological theory of evolution into a completely different political theory) that Darwin's theory should be rejected as the best current scientific explanation of certain observations about the natural world. Those historical facts do not justify a sufficient paradigm shift that changes what is currently taught in the Utah primary and secondary science curriculum.
Your facts suggest an alternative reform to address the very real evil that you have identified:
Ethics, basic western philosophy, conflict-resolution skills, media and propaganda analysis, democractic participation skills, and modern history should be deeply integrated into the curriculum of our primary and secondary public education system. Funding for primary and secondary education should be increased to assure that the very best and inspired teachers instill these basic skills into the next generation. A well-educated citizenry competent in such skills is a pre-condition to a vital modern democracy. That is the best preventative medicine to combat the history of the first half of the 20th century from repeating itself.
Teaching intelligent design seems IMHO unconnected to the problem that you identify.
Again, my apologies to the listserv participants for this overlength and somewhat over the top response to Jim and Don.
The weekend and other obligations call. See you next week.
- Canopus56
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