First, the objections to radiometric dating seem to be demanding a mythical “crucial experiment.” Crucial experiments, in which one experiment, by itself, establishes the truth or falsehood of an hypothesis, are not completely unknown, but their mythical, highly celebrated status stems from their rarity. Most scientific statements are based on a preponderance of the evidence; well-established ones are based on an overwhelming convergence of evidence. But (pace Popper) a few contradictory results do not instantly destroy a theory, nor can we expect a single “crucial experiment” to establish one in the presence of contradictory evidence.
I have no doubt that Dr. Berger wrote that with the most altruistic of intentions, and what follows is by no means directed against what he wrote per se but the underlying worldview from whence it stems and to which he must, as an imprimatured scientist, pay due obedience.
Looking at this, I see, "No crucial experiment exists, therefore evolution." IOW, "We don't know, but since we want evolution to be true, we're going to bias all conclusions in that direction, building on the shoulders of giants who have similarly biased their conclusions in that direction over the past 150 years and we'll call this 'preponderance of evidence.' We will give a weighting of zero to the underlying enmity against God motivating this bias, and we will likewise give a weighting of zero to special revelation, since we don't want it to be true and cannot accept it."
Fundamentally, people will believe what they wish to believe, whatever best supports their worldview (good vs. evil, live for God vs. live for myself). They will ridicule others with beliefs that diverge from their own. They will try to frame the debate in a manner favorable to their own conclusions. You do it. I do it. We all do it. None of us gets to pretend we come to the table free of our own internal biases, no matter how subtle. None are neutral in this long ongoing war between good and evil, and we do well to be frank and honest on that front.
obeisance
Thank you for reading the link. I think you’re reading a lot into Dr. Berger’s motivations. For one, since he describes himself as a conservative Christian who had reservations about letting his letter be published on that blog, I’m surprised you think he would dismiss an underlying enmity against God if he thought it existed or was an important factor in the promotion of the ToE.
And I watched some of your link—enough to get to his explanation of the radiometric testing process, at least. (I don’t have an hour to give to it.) I only saw him discuss one example of multiple tests—Leakey skull 1470—but he impies, falsely I think, that the singular result he mentions was the one they were looking for. (All the book says is that they never got that particular result again, not that it was the one they hoped for.) He also cites the range of results in a way that the results were scattered throughout the range, while it’s also possible that they coalesced around a central value in a bell curve. I, frankly, just don’t know. From what I read, it does appear that the rocks around that skull (and they were dating the rocks, not the skull itself) presented a particularly challenging task, especially 40 years ago when it was found. I’d like to hear an actual scientist explain why the results were all over the map and how they arrived at the one they finally settled on. I don’t trust Dr. Patton to give a fair presentation.