21 Dec 05
Originally posted by rwingettMaybe we could designate creationists of sas's stripe with a lower case 'c' (as sas himself does) and reserve an upper-case 'c' for Creationists like KellyJay for example.
You don't seem to use the term "creationism" in quite the same sense that most do. While it may be true that someone who believes in a creator is a creationist in a broad sense, most go further to define the term as also meaning the rejection of evolution. Someone who believes in a creator god that is the guiding hand behind evolution (as I believe you've said you do) would not be a creationist in the narrower sense of the word.
21 Dec 05
Originally posted by sasquatch6721. I was referring to Irreducible Complexity, not ID. Most of your comments are based on the misunderstanding that I was talking about the latter.
How, exactly, does ID provide a good illustration of the Scientific Method? ID relies on proponents throwing out the Scientific Method in its entirety. When scientific theories are challenged, they're challenged with new scientific theories. ID does not come within a light-year of approaching a "scientific theory". ID doesn't provide any data at ...[text shortened]... creationism - and like I said, I believe that God created the universe. But ID is not science.
2.a. I didn't define 'mainstream science'; I didn't introduce the term at all. It was twitehead who used the term - I'm just asking him to define it.
b. Since you define 'mainstream science' to be "latest available and most accurate working model", it should be obvious to you why Newtonian Mechanics is not 'mainstream science' (by your own definition) - it has been superseded by Relativistic Mechanics (last I checked - there might be even more recent theories of mechanics that are more 'mainstream'😉.
FYI, the laws of thermodynamics are not part of Newtonian mechanics.
21 Dec 05
Originally posted by no1marauderI guess the really puzzling thing about this tale is that it's too fcuking bizarre to be true. You wouldn't believe it, even if you seen it on a Discovery Channel documentary.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/10545387/
No surprise; ID is a thinly veiled attempt to oust evolution (a scientific theory) from science classes and replace it with creationism (a religious dogma). The school board does not plan to appeal; 8 pro-ID members were thrown out by the embarrassed voters of Harrisburg in the last election.
21 Dec 05
Originally posted by sasquatch672Are you changing your definition of 'mainstream science' now? Is economy, rather than accuracy, your primary criterion?
You're parsing. You don't need relativistic mechanics to explain the vast majority of observable phenomena - Newtonian mechanics works just fine. Relativistic mechanics applies inside a particle accelerator and a few other specialized examples.
21 Dec 05
"It is ironic that several of these individuals, who so staunchly and proudly touted their religious convictions in public, would time and again lie to cover their tracks and disguise the real purpose behind the ID Policy."
That is the statement from the judge's conclusion that I find most interesting.
Christians violating one of the core laws of their belief to push their own agenda. Good to see such a publicly eye-opening statement made.
21 Dec 05
Originally posted by no1marauderThank God! (no pun intended)
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/10545387/
No surprise; ID is a thinly veiled attempt to oust evolution (a scientific theory) from science classes and replace it with creationism (a religious dogma). The school board does not plan to appeal; 8 pro-ID members were thrown out by the embarrassed voters of Harrisburg in the last election.
21 Dec 05
Originally posted by sasquatch672I'm with sasquatch (calm down man - stress is bad for the heart) on this one. Of course scienctists use less complex models - science IS a less complex model of the real universe - just so we with our primitive cerebrums can understand what's actually happenning. When Nasa flies a rocket to the moon, in their model the earth is the centre of the universe. Why? Because it's the simplest model that allows the tragectories etc to be computed. When they fly to Jupiter, on the other hand, the Sun becomes the centre of the Universe. We've never flown far enough to make the supermassive black hole at the centre of our universe the centre of the universe in our simulations - there is no point.... Just like this post really.
First of all - I'm in a very bad mood today. Second - Newtonian mechanics is mainstream science for EVERY SINGLE macroscopic phenomenon that occurs at speeds we don't compare to the speed of light. Get it? It is mainstream science.
Third - OF COURSE SCIENTISTS AND MATHEMATICIANS USE SIMPLIFIED MODELS WHERE WE CAN. There are only five known thin ...[text shortened]... ating me today. I'm sure it's more me than you, but you're the one in front of me right now.
21 Dec 05
Originally posted by sasquatch672First - relax, you're not the only person having a bad day. It's 8 at night and I'm still in the office!
First of all - I'm in a very bad mood today. Second - Newtonian mechanics is mainstream science for EVERY SINGLE macroscopic phenomenon that occurs at speeds we don't compare to the speed of light. Get it? It is mainstream science.
Third - OF COURSE SCIENTISTS AND MATHEMATICIANS USE SIMPLIFIED MODELS WHERE WE CAN. There are only five known thin ...[text shortened]... ating me today. I'm sure it's more me than you, but you're the one in front of me right now.
Second - the questions around what constitute 'mainstream science' were intended for twitehead. His comments seemed to suggest that science was more a question of popularity among scientists than accuracy or, as you've pointed, utility.
21 Dec 05
Originally posted by lucifershammerhmm, if you want an example of what I'd call tangential (i.e. non-mainstream) science here goes..
First - relax, you're not the only person having a bad day. It's 8 at night and I'm still in the office!
Second - the questions around what constitute 'mainstream science' were intended for twitehead. His comments seemed to suggest that science was more a question of popularity among scientists than accuracy or, as you've pointed, utility.
i was at the Society for Experimental Biology Main Annual Meeting a couple of years back, and in the General Plant Biology there was a talk by a young lady, I forget where she was from, who was looking to identify the function of a gene she'd characterised in the experimental plant Arabidopsis. Now Arabidopsis is a small weedy plant, which is only really used in science for genetics work because it has a small, simple genome. All fine so far.
This gene that she'd identified, she went on to inform us had a 33% homology (shares 33% of the DNA nucleotide sequence - not really tremendously impressive in mol biol) with a MADS box gene in mammals for hip joints. At this point, my friend sitting next to me, a german professor called Wolfram Hartung, whispered in my ear "I wasn't aware that Arabidopsis had hip joints". This was quite enough to set me off laughing for the remainder of the talk - couldn't look straight at the woman as she described her plans to study the DNA of mammals to work out the function of this gene in plants. So yes, you do get nutters in science working on ideas that are just plain stupid.
Science, unfortunately, does go through fads. At the moment molecular biology is the big fad - if it doesn't have the word 'gene' in the research proposal you don't stand much of a chance of getting it funded. Sad, but true....
22 Dec 05
Originally posted by lucifershammerIrreducible complexity is not science because there is no mathematical definition of "complexity" which can be quantified and experimentally examined.
1. Two reasons why it should be taught:
a. It provides a good illustration of the scientific method. Scientific theories are, and must be, often challenged. Not all challenges are going to be successful - but that does not mean an established theory should not be challenged as new data arises.
b. It is popular with the ID movement and many kids are ...[text shortened]... " but are still taught to kids - e.g. Newtonian mechanics, the Planetary Model of the Atom etc.