Why won't the Creationists talk turkey?

Great Debates
101

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Groan… once again, I’m frustrated with arrogant know-it-alls and cowards. If I were frustrated with people just because they didn’t have a degree in molecular biology, I’d spend a whole lot of time being frustrated.

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Can you honestly read what I’ve written here and say that I’m dismissing people’s arguments before I read them?

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I’m sorry you found it to be so. My point was that the provisionality of science exists across a spectrum. Flat earthers cann’t just say, “science never proves anything once and for all, so maybe tomorrow we’ll learn that the earth is flat.” Some things (round earth, atomic theory, evolution) have been proven so overwhelmingly that the likelihood that we’ll see any abrupt reversals is small. Instead, we’ll make small changes (the earth isn’t a perfect sphere, the solar system model of the atom is wrong, etc.) as our understanding improves. The problem is that you state that evolution could be utterly disproven, and you compare it to much less well-established science, like the epidemiology of newly discovered and poorly understood diseases like BSE.

-Ben

102

I can understand that… people who are so certain about everything can be really annoying at times. Especially if they behave in a superior manner when engaging with others.

Fact is, we can have different opinions on certain things but the fun is finding the common ground which I suspect is there more often than not.

Steady Ben, I said that I’m trying to listen more. Jumping on me like that might be taken as you not listening to what I said, which I do not believe is true.

No problem. Like I said, debate is about challenging things.

I take your point… it’s a fair one. Problem was, the scientists that propounded their ideas did so with great certainity. On reflection, they came over as arrogant and know-it-alls. They were very dismissive of any suggetion of a link between animal and human health hazards!

If the science concerned was indeed, poorly understood, then that only makes their approach more misguided.

They dissappeared pretty rapidly when the first deaths were attributed to the disease that they had insisted could not happen.

Arrogance is not the sole domain on non-scientists. It comes over loud and clear from all sections of the community including scientists sometimes.

pax

103

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And why are you telling me this? Tell it to the people I’m criticising, who mock evolution and then flee from any kind of serious discussion. Like I said, I would much rather not be so critical. I would like a world in which the creationists generally had an honest desire to learn, and to sit down and have an honest conversation. But IME, they generally don’t.

Let’s face it: when creationists misbehave, and I take them to task for it, I’m the one who gets lectured by you, while you don’t have a word of criticism for mornea. It takes two to tango, and I’ve indicated several times that I’m willing to have a serious, polite discussion about C/E. So when mornea (or Mahaloth or WB) fails to approach the discussion honestly, why am I at fault for the lack of serious discussion?

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Who said I was jumping on you? You seemed to be suggesting that I could benefit by listening more. I asked you to reassess whether that suggestion was appropriate.

Let me make sure I understand you. Have you now dropped the argument that the BSE incident proves that evolution could be wrong, and are now arguing that scientists can be as arrogant and misguided as creationists often are?

-Ben

104

I don’t want to speak for Ben, but I think my feelings on the subject (although not my knowledge) are similar.

If a creationist says “I’ve heard and understand the science, but I still believe that god made everything as we see it now, for reasons unknown to us”, well you can’t argue much with that. People have every right to believe what they will, no matter my views on the subject. You can argue the philosophical question of why god apparently wants to fools us, but not the position itself.

If a creationist says “I’ve not heard and/or don’t understand the science, and don’t care, because god made everything as we see it now, for reasons unknown to us”, same thing goes. This kind of willful ignorance is sad, but what can you do? Once again there are philosophical questions that can be debated here, but from a scientific point of view, you can’t argue much with “God did it in some fashion you don’t (and probably can’t) know”.

But when a creationist says “Your science is flawed, and I think that there is (or will be, or might be) scientific evidence for creation, and you just haven’t found it (or are ignoring it, or have seen it and are misinterpreting it), and since you can’t say your science is 100% right, my science has just as much chance of being right as your science”, well then we have a different matter.

Cases like the last one are what set the “fighting ignorance” bells ringing. People who have no understanding of the basic science at all, and yet simply dismiss it because of their own incredulity, can (and should, IMHO) be challenged.

This also goes for the people who, without a hint of understanding of the actual science involved, read some poorly researched “facts” (and sometimes outright lies) from some nitwit source like the ICR website, and now believe they can speak with authority and say, “Your science is flawed”.

Well, if they think mainstream science is flawed, and that they (or their sources) have the answers, let them take the stage and answer the tough questions once in a while. It probably won’t help, but it’s only fair.

Ugly

105

Would you read this Discover article on transposons and see if it has any mistakes?

Could transposons be the reason why species apparently appear and disappear so abruptly in the fossil record?

106

Wasn’t this Ben’s line of arguement?

It certainly seems to me that Ben is using that arguement. Otherwise I see no reason for a creationist to answer the stumper questions.

107

If creationism is a “science”, or a coherent philosophy, or even internally self-consistent, it must have answers to the hard questions such as those, too. If it is helpless in explaining observable phenomena, then it has no claim to be anything more than religious dogma.

If the creation “science” camp cannot answer relevant questions that they themselves have not picked, then they can either quit congratulating themselves and try harder, or consider the possibility that their conceptual framework is inadequate to explain the world in front of their own noses. If the answer is simply “Well, God made it that way, so there”, then there’s no reason to consider it as anything more than dogma. Either way, the questions posed are legitimate ones about relevant real facts, not “stumpers”.

108

Are all theological inherently flawed?

I am in your camp but this debate has dismissed ideas which may be valid.

109

That was supposed to be “Are all theoligical arguments inherntly flawed?” If you thik so, then you have taken yourself down to the uneducated level that the Creationists are accused of

110

“thik”?

I need to proofread more carefully.

111

Not all theological arguments are flawed. However, those theological arguments that make empirical claims had best be able to back those claims up.

112

True. But we must not dismiss them. There are many forms of logic beyond “empirical”.

All I am saying is that, as scientific minded people, we MUST ask “What if we are wrong?” Without doubt in scientific “dogma” (do not for a second doubt that there is such a thing), there can be no progress.

All of the OP’s question’s CAN be answered with the simple logic that “God made it that way. He is simply using interchangeable parts and updating models as He sees fit” I know that this rankles us scientists, but it does have a certain logic. Debating this issue from an ivory tower of “science” while dismissing all non “scientific” viewpoints demeans science itself. Keep the mind open.

113

ElvisL1ves called this a “religion thread”, but it’s not really, or shouldn’t be. If we’re talking about “scientific” creationism or creation “science”–the claim that not only is Genesis a true account of the origins of the Universe and human beings, but that the empirical evidence backs this up–then this is a scientific, not a religious or philosophical claim. You can’t make “theological” arguments in science–have you ever seen the classic S. Harris cartoon? “I think you should be more explicit here in step two.”

114

Yes. EVERY question can be answered that way.

“Why do the hulls of ships disappear over the horizon before their sails do?”

“Why do some of the planets appear to move backwards in the sky?”

“What makes rainbows?”

“Why is it that when people get sick and die, sometimes other people who’ve been around them get sick and die the same way?”

“Oh, that’s just the way God makes things do.”

And we would never have undersood anything.

115

Yes. But “God made it that way” is not a scientific statement, simply because it can’t be falsified. However it is, that’s the way God made it. I’m gonna take it one step further and say that that statement contains no information.

116

That is exactly my point. If we are not willing to debate on a theological level, we might as well be banging our heads against a wall.

117

Hey, Beeblebrox, I got news for ya’…

118

I know, I know.

Let’s just keep our minds open, shall we?

119

“Always keep an open mind, but not so open that your brains fall out.”

Seriously, do we want scientists–and science teachers in public schools–debating theology? Scientists deal with questions of fact and factual evidence. All the factual evidence points to certain conclusions–that the Universe is so-and-so many billions of years old, that existing living things–including people–evolved from different forms of life, and so on. Scientists, as scientists, can only go on what the facts say. As human beings, they may have other opinions on all sorts of subjects, of course.

120

Out of curiosity, what do you propose we (playing the part of scientists) do with the idea that God may have created everything (i.e., Special Creation)? Since the statement is, as others have pointed out and as you well know, untestable and therefore unfalsifiable, of what use is it to science? If it is of no use in science, what do we gain by acknowledging that it may have been the case? Already, no self-respecting scientist claims that Science is Truth; it is the current “best guess,” based on the evidence at hand.

Or, to put it another way…

OK, we have an open mind. Now what?