In fossilized fish eye, rods and cones preserved for 300 million years

LATimes ^ | Deborah Netburn

[BroJoeK]

Mechanicos: "The issue is what you call science is nothing more then Scholastic authority.
It is not the scientific method.
Its ideological theory masquerading as science that rejects any facts that tend to show its incorrect."

It seems you've found a weapon of mass disinformation you hope to use against science: just hand-wave anything you dislike as "Scholastic authority", or "circular reasoning" and presto-change-o, you can reduce it to "non-science" or "ideological theory", and your job is done!
Way to go big boy!
I mean, why should anybody bother with the hard work of presenting facts, reasons & conclusions in cogent forms, when all you really need do is hand-wave it away as "Scholastic authority"?

Of course, it is true...
The US Supreme Court was asked to rule, and did so, saying that for purposes of public education, only scientists, not anti-scientists like yourself, could decide just exactly what is, or is not real science.
In that sense, in public elementary & secondary schools, "Scholastic authority" does trump whatever false accusations you make regarding "circular reasoning", "bootstrapping", etc.

[BroJoeK]

microgood: "The bottom line is that theories like Evolution and the Big Bang are historical sciences, trying to determine what happened milllions of years ago."

So far as I know, nobody but traditionalist Christians use that term "historical sciences" in any argumentative sense -- as if "historical science" is somehow less "scientific" than what you call "operational science".
By using that term, you reveal your pose as "philosopher" is false, and in reality, you are here to promote your own religious ideas of Creationism.

microgood: "Outside of Physics and Biology, the rest of the sciences operate in a different level of believability."

Actually, if you think about it, your so-called "historical sciences" are the same type of science as forensic science, which is used in courtrooms every day as proof of innocence or guilt, to convict or set free defendants, beyond a reasonable doubt.

Of course, science itself never uses such terms as "proof" or "conviction", but juries of ordinary human beings do, and they do it based on those same "historical sciences" which you are here to proclaim as "junk science."

So, let me say this yet again: you are absolutely entitled to believe whatsoever you wish to believe about the past -- whatever your scriptures tell you, howsoever your faith interprets them, you can believe it... provided, provided you do not call those beliefs "science".

They are not, and you should not pretend they are.
By definition, your faith is outside, above and beyond all science -- always was, is now and always will be.

[Altariel]

You mean they just now found the April Fool’s gag from 1215—the-one-that-I-know-nothing-about-and-wasn’t-involved-in?

[microgood]

By using that term, you reveal your pose as "philosopher" is false, and in reality, you are here to promote your own religious ideas of Creationism.

Nice try, but I am not looking at this from a religious point of view. I have a Bachelor of Arts degree in Philosophy in addition to my Electrical Engineering Degree. I am simply stating that Evolution uses circular reasoning in its defense of the theory, which is a fact.

I use the term "historical science" because it is trying to figure out what happened millions of years ago whereas any theories of Modern Physics or Modern Chemistry or Modern Biology can directly test their theories in the modern world. Testing whether Einstein's theory of general relativity can happen now, whereas testing of whether one species evolved from another can only be done indirectly and in a highly speculative way. They operate in two different levels of believability.

[microgood]

By the way, I put the Big Bang theory in the same category as other “historical sciences” like evolution, archeology, paleontology, etc. It has the same issues as all other sciences that try to explain the past.

[BroJoeK]

microgood: "I am simply stating that Evolution uses circular reasoning in its defense of the theory, which is a fact."

But that's not a "fact", it's a false accusation, offered with no evidence or logic to demonstrate it.
Issuing false accusations makes you a ____, and yet again exposes your "philosopher" pose here as false.

Indeed, your Feinberg/Landau quote above, "using the scientific method to judge the scientific method is circular reasoning", is beyond nonsensical.
In fact, scientific methods are simply tools, which either work or don't.
Science's work-products are theories -- explanations of patterns -- describing how the "natural world" operates.
We judge those theories by how well they work in predicting natural events.
If, in your opinion, that is "circular reasoning", then your opinions are cruel and unusual punishments of normal logic.

microgood: "Testing whether Einstein's theory of general relativity can happen now, whereas testing of whether one species evolved from another can only be done indirectly and in a highly speculative way.
They operate in two different levels of believability."

First of all, as I have explained here more than once now: science is always careful not to claim more than its data appropriately allows.
That's why it turns out, your complaint about alleged "definitive truth" is just another false accusation, and the news-article's actual term of "definitive proof" never once appeared in the real scientific report it refers to.
That scientific paper is rich in data, calculations, tables, graphs & photos, but only uses terms like "evidence" and "suggests", which is how all such reports are written.
That's because such science is not about "definitive proof", or "truth", much less "faith" & "doctrine."
It is about, just like forensic science, using the evidence to recreate, as accurately as possible: what really happened "way back when".

So I'll say it again: you are not required to believe a word science tells us, just don't call your own religious beliefs "science", FRiend.

Second of all, your assertion that "...testing of whether one species evolved from another can only be done indirectly and in a highly speculative way" is simply not accurate.
Just like forensic scientists recreating a crime scene, "historical scientists" study countless details at the microscopic and chemical levels to determine what roles they played in the Great Scheme of Things.
Those minute details include innumerable observations on daily operations of:

1. physics
2. chemistry
3. biology
4. morphology
5. DNA
6. creatures' descent with modifications,
7. average mutations per generation,
8. natural selection,
9. adaptions,
10. genetic drift,
11. evolution of new breeds and sub-species,
12. DNA match-ups between closely related species versus more distantly related biological genera, families, orders, etc.
13. geological stratigraphic dating
14. plate tectonics & continental drift
15. cosmological dating of the Universe age & evolution
16. and many more too numerous to list.

All of these support the Big Picture, of how the Earth and life evolved over billions of years.
Indeed, there are no scientifically confirmed observations -- none -- which seriously contradict it.

Does that make it absolute "definitive truth"?
No, of course not, nothing in science is.
But it certainly does make it the best theory (read: "pattern") we have, and indeed are ever likely to have.

That's all science ever claims to be.

[Natufian]

Empirically.