To continue RE: My quibble with your Second point, freedumb2003, that Darwin’s theory is accepted science — so accepted, in fact, that it cannot be questioned by any sensible person now living.
But if that is the case, then it seems to me we have entirely left the precinct of science, and are venturing into wholly ideological territory, a territory unhinged, untroubled by, any connection with the actually Reality in which you and I and everybody else actually lives.
For openers, science itself is an intergenerational, communal and social effort that has a noble mission and tradition to maintain. Science can’t tell us everything we’d like to know, but we have confidence that, in what they do tell us, that is reliable.
To evaluate this issue, it seems best to mention at the outset the gist of two different points of view of what constitutes Reality, and what constitutes Science. Historically, culturally in the West, the latter has ever been thought of as the devoted student and explicator of the former. That is to say, science per se is not the principle creative activity in Nature. The purview of science is a very restricted one, based as it is on the method that distinguishes it as a valid intellectual activity: That is, a method based on direct observation (as technologically made more keen over time), and on successful and replicable experiments designed to “falsify” (or by default, “justify”) whatever outcome the experiment is seeking to achieve.
But what science never does, nor can do, is to PROVE anything. “Proof” is a term that belongs to mathematics alone. Science is about making descriptions of Nature, to as high a probabilistic determination as possible. Which ALWAYS falls short of 100% accuracy.
I am probably not alone in thinking of physics as the preeminent discipline in the natural sciences. Its propositions are rigorous and widely testable. As a discipline, it has shown itself adept in assimilating new evidence. Which is how human knowledge of Reality progresses from Ptolemy to Einstein.
Which means that physical science is ineluctably subject to change, subject to subsequent modification as new evidence comes into play.
David Bohm sums this up quite nicely:
…Newtonian mechanics, thought originally to be of completely universal validity, was eventually found to be valid in a limited domain (velocity small compared with light) and only to a limited degree of approximation. Newtonian mechanics had to give way to the theory of relativity which utilized basic conceptions concerning space and time which were in many ways not consistent with those of Newtonian mechanics. The new theory was, therefore, in certain essential features qualitatively and fundamentally different from the old one. Nevertheless, within the domain of low velocities, the new theory approached the old one as a limited case. In a similar way, classical mechanics eventually gave way to the quantum theory, which is very different in its basic structure, but which still contains classical theory as a limited case, valid approximately in the domain of large quantum numbers. Agreement with experiments in a limited domain and to a limited degree of approximation is evidently no proof, therefore, that the basic concepts of a given theory have a completely universal validity. — Wholeness and the Implicate Order, 1980, p. 105How come the biological sciences don’t work this way? NOTHING has changed with Darwin’s theory for the past 160 years. Every new discovery becomes new “proof” that Darwin’s theory is correct. And God help the brave person who suggests otherwise!!!
To those folks looking for “certainty in Nature” I have only one observation: The only certainty in Nature is that Nature is uncertain. BUT — Nature is not random.
On such grounds, I object to the idea that Darwinism is somehow the sine qua non of Biology, let alone a valid scientific theory.
Biology is purportedly the “scientific” study of living beings.
In what follows, I’m taking my page from physics, physics being a relentlessly rigorous scientific discipline that is able to propound its thinking in terms of universal mathematical language. Also it is remarkable for its ability to assimilate new evidence that confounds old theories. If that were not so, then we’d all still be stuck in Ptolemy’s Geocentric Model of the universe, and Einstein would be completely, totally unintelligible to the human species, not to mention Niels Bohr.
I do not notice a similar enthusiasm for embracing change as a matter of scientific principle in devotees of Darwin’s theory.
The reasons I think Darwin’s Evolutionary Theory is NOT a valid scientific theory:
(1) Scientific theories must, in principle, be testable. And not only testable, but replicable by other observers, using the same basic test apparatus as adjusted to local conditions as need be. Somebody please tell me how the central premise of Darwin’s theory — that one species can convert itself, via its progeny, into a kind different than itself — that is, into a “new species — can possibly be true, since no human observer, after all this historical time, has been able to report such a finding? And since no feasible experiment seems forthcoming to test such an hypothesis?
Not all of the Reality we humans live in is directly observable in all its aspects. Yet the answer to some questions that affect us most deeply must be inferred from what can be “seen,” not just by what we feel. We are profoundly affected by the effects of “non-observables” at many levels. Thus frequent “reality checks” seem to be in order. :>)
But in any case, science cannot reach to the problem of non-observables, or justly to have anything to say about them. That doesn’t mean that the problem of non-observables just “goes away,” because Science thinks it’s unprofitable and/or bunk, methodologically speaking, to track them down. Rather, that study legitimately falls to theology and philosophy.
Finally, science cannot define Nature. However, as "formal observer," it can attempt to describe (to the maximum possible accuracy it has at hand) what Nature is — as seen from the standpoint of a particular, given point in time.
There is a "problem" that we humans actually L IVE in — and live OUT of — the very “problem” that science per se CANNOT address, given the self-imposed limit of its method.
Thus in conclusion, my objection to Darwinism is that it never changes. It’s been around since 1859, and there is nothing going on with its “creed” that has been modified by more recent experience of any description whatsoever. If anything, Darwinist theory is being used as a screening tool to prohibit free speech contradicting its (alarmingly partial) account of biological organisms — in the natural sciences, in the academy, in the elite journals, in public opinion.
The thought struck me today that Darwin’s theory is, in itself, a “fossil.” Of course, there’s irony there, in that Darwin himself worried that his theory depended on the by-then-known fossil record of his own day, which was very spotty to say the least. Yet he said that his theory would either rise or fall on the paleontological/fossil record yet to be established over time.
That Darwinism purports to be THE principal science of biology just gives me the fits. The theory says nothing about the origin of life, or its subsequent biological organization necessary to the maintenance of a living state. Darwin does not deal with such problems. All he wants to show you is how one “species” turns into another “species.” [And of course, we can always quibble about the meaning of “species” if we have nothing better to do….]
In conclusion, I just think that Darwin’s Evolution theory is the greatest Myth of our Time. It has absolutely no merit as a scientific theory, because it does not speak the language of science (mathematical formulation); it cannot design an experiment to prove its main holding — that is, to demonstrate it is possible for one species to become another species under laboratory conditions.
Finally, Darwinism proposes an (untested) directive by which further discourse regarding Nature is to prescribe to its theory that evolution is wholly undirected in its operation without deviation; that is, everything in Nature happens by chance.
If one is in the business of rent-seeking from federal taxpayers and/or other third parties, in support of such groundless “research,” I have only one thing to say to you: Please get another living, please get a LIFE. Speaking as a federal taxpayer, I’m sick and tired of paying for this kind of garbage.
In the end, your message is: Winners win; Losers lose. That’s just the way it is…. Whatta concept!!! Thank you Charlie Darwin!
Bye-bye for now, dear freedom2003. We obviously disagree on the Second point. Still, thank you so much for writing!
And of course I very strongly agree with on all your other points as well.
I don't know how you can say that. Darwin knew nothing of DNA and little of genetics (much less epigenetics). He was mistaken in his idea of how traits get passed on. He would have been unable to explain recessive genes, or why differences persisted rather than being bred out, or why one child might have blue eyes while the rest have brown. Plus, he was a gradualist, while current thinking includes at least some instances of more rapid change. The only way what you say is accurate is if you mean Darwin himself hasn't updated his theory. That I'll give you. Otherwise, let me quote this guy:
We have learned much since Darwin's time and it is no longer appropriate to claim that evolutionary biologists believe that Darwin's theory of Natural Selection is the best theory of the mechanism of evolution.... the Modern Synthesis is a theory about how evolution works at the level of genes, phenotypes, and populations whereas Darwinism was concerned mainly with organisms, speciation and individuals. This is a major paradigm shift...Every new discovery becomes new “proof” that Darwin’s theory is correct.
Kinda like the germ theory of disease in that respect, I guess.
I do not notice a similar enthusiasm for embracing change as a matter of scientific principle in devotees of Darwin’s theory.
Oh come on. We grew up with slow, dumb gray-green dinosaurs, and now we have quick colorfully feathered ones. We used to portray transistional species like Archaeopteryx as stops on the direct line from dinosaurs to birds, but now we speak of clades and the idea of branching more than linear evolution. We're now investigating the influence of epigenetics, a field undreamed of 25 years ago.
One last thought: everything you say about the theory of evolution--well, the accurate parts, anyway--could be true, and it could still be right.